Off the Shoulder of Orion
by Alpha Flyer
Summary: Tom Paris learns what it means to issue orders, as Captain of a recommissioned Voyager. In the course of a humanitarian mission, the crew encounters an ancient evil and a dangerous enemy.
1. Beginnings

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Some of you have been waiting patiently for Tom's first adventure as Captain of Voyager. You still would be, but for Runawaymetaphor's amazing willingness to provide the requisite acerbic encouragement. Thanks also to Snow6835, for suggesting some time ago that I allow some space in this venture to show Tom's crewmates' reaction to his promotion. (Janeway's is dealt with in "In the Moonlight", which takes place the evening before this one begins).

In order to preserve certain plot elements I won't get into details about themes here (except to observe that sometimes, promotion can be a double-edged sword…). Just one personal note: I spent some very happy childhood hours on a sailboat built by my late uncle; he named it after Bellatrix, the star that forms the right shoulder of the constellation of Orion. This is pure coincidence, of course, and only occurred to me after I started writing this story. But perhaps it's a fitting reminder of the many different ways in which we become who we are - more often than not in response to the opportunities we are offered or the choices we make - or those that we are denied. I know I got lucky.

Paramount owns everything except the story, and the locations and characters that exist only in my own personal post-Endgame universe. (Please see my profile page for a list of the stories that precede this one; reading those is not essential, but might help you appreciate some internal references.) And before you ask – yes, the title pays homage to Ridley Scott's _Bladerunner,_ one of the best sci fi movies of all time; I don't own that, either. I write for fun, not profit.

* * *

><p><strong>OFF THE SHOULDER OF ORION<strong>

**By Alpha Flyer**

_The more freedom we enjoy, the greater the responsibility we bear,_

_toward others as well as ourselves._

Oscar Arias Sanchez

* * *

><p><em><strong>Prologue<strong>_

_She sits tightly curled in a corner in her tiny, windowless quarters, cradling a cup of hot raktajino from the public replicator on the promenade. Her sensitive skin is not taking well to the ambient temperature on the station, kept low to increase the owners' profits; she shivers in the near dark. And so she holds the cup tightly with both hands, grateful more for the warmth it will gift her chilled fingers than for the stimulants it contains - although these are what she will need._

_What you need is not always what you want._

_It has been a long evening already, but her work is not yet done. In the artificial light of the space station, where night and day blend into one, she knows there are clients waiting to watch her dance, perhaps for more. She sighs a little, although last night had been lucrative; the delegation from Andor had been generous and the Ambassador not unkind, afterwards. _

_Kindness is relative. _

_But all things considered, she would have preferred servicing the Ferengi. They are stingy with their tips but would always honour a deal – especially since she excels at Oomax, the stroking of earlobes. Ferengi usually travel in packs of three or four, and she can have them all passed out in bliss within an hour or two. Easy money. Those nights she makes quota early, and can go back to her quarters after the accounting, to count the money she is saving to buy out her contract._

_Money is the path to freedom. _

_They had promised, when she was first being trained, that she would be able to buy out her contract after twenty years, earlier if she could pay the penalty. But somehow the money does not seem to accumulate as quickly as they had said; even the regular buy-out date seems to recede further each month. Fifteen years to go – and there are always medical bills to be paid, new dancing outfits to be replicated. The rent on her spare little room, owned by her employer, has been raised twice already since her arrival; the occasional small indulgence, like the raktajino she is holding now, is a luxury she grants herself rarely._

_Fifteen years is a lifetime._

_Time to go; her break is over. She hopes that tonight will yet be good, just a few more dances, some teasing conversation, maybe a short encounter or two in a darkened corner of the bar, or in the suite on Deck Three for those who can afford more. Right now, things are not too bad. It has been a while since she has been beaten - her dermal and osteo-regenerators are fully charged, just in case – and she has reason to hope that her luck has finally turned. The clients at this station seem to have less … exotic tastes than those at her last assignment, and pay reasonably well. She can almost accept what she is, here. Almost._

_Acceptance is surrender._

_But as she passes the mirror on the wall, the one beside the door that will tell her, as she leaves her room, whether she is beautiful enough to light up the night, she pauses for a moment to reflect what else she is. What she wants to be. _

_Not … this._

_Every day she watches for them as she dances for others; she watches and waits - for the men and women in the grey uniforms. Once or twice, she has listened to their laughter, their carefree banter; heard them boast about where they have been, talk with shining eyes about where they are going. They come here rarely though and have not for some time, but she dreams of their return. She wants to be of them, not with them. She has heard it is possible, even for her kind, has heard the whispered tales of hope. Impossible dreams, but ... _

_Dreams sustain her._

_She puts her hand on the pad that opens the door. Once, dreaming of a space where she can be herself, not what she has been made into, she tried to program the door so that it would open only for her, for the touch of her finger alone. They showed her how easy it was to defeat this type of lock. Not with her own finger of course - she has to remain unblemished, for the clients. But the point had been made and she has not tried to lock herself away from them again. _

_The moment will come when there would be only her._

_She will bide her time._

…_.._

**Chapter 1 – Beginnings**

_San Francisco, Earth_

"Captain on the Bridge."

The little whistle intoned the ceremonial doo-wee-oo as Tom Paris exited the turbolift and walked onto the bridge, flanked by an honour guard that consisted of his best friend, Harry Kim, and his former commanding officer, Captain William Riker.

Suppressing the little shiver that had run down his spine at the whistle – knowing it sounded for _him_ - he cast a look at the eclectic audience assembled on _Voyager's_ bridge, and swallowed.

The number of admirals on the bridge exceeded the requirements of the occasion; he supposed he should be flattered. Of course, Kathryn Janeway was there, she had to be. Seated in the command chair that had been hers for so many years, she stroked its arm unconsciously with slender, delicate fingers, as if to memorize its texture. She gave Tom a private smile as their eyes caught briefly.

His father had come, of course, beaming with pride, in uniform despite his official retirement. And Tom was more than pleased to see Jean-Luc Picard, who had selected him for advanced command training at the Kirk Centre just over two years ago - over the express reservation of some of his colleagues, as Tom had later learned.

But seeing Hayes and Bullock, not to mention Fleet Admiral Alynna Nacheyev, standing behind Janeway – now that was a surprise. Tom could only assume that the Ice Queen had summoned her favourite sidekicks to make them help her atone for the wringer through which they had put Tom and Will, just a few short weeks ago, when her orders had made them into Starfleet's unwitting poster boys for changes to the Prime Directive. The outcome of the trial, and the admiralty's possible role in it, were still being debated in the media.

Nonetheless, this was a time to be gracious, and Tom inclined his head towards what he privately considered Starfleet's Unholy Trinity, in official recognition of the honour he knew was being bestowed upon him. He had, after all, been born and bred for moments like this and could play the game, when called upon, with the best of them. Nacheyev returned his polite acknowledgement with a thin-lipped smile, and a reciprocal slight bow of the head.

Tom scanned the crowded bridge. His face lost its tension and he broke out in a smile when he spotted the family members he had been allowed to invite. B'Elanna winked at him as she held onto Miral, to stop her from running up to him as per the little girl's usual habit when she had been separated from her Daddy for longer than half an hour. His mother and sisters and their boys, who seemed to be far more interested in inspecting the gleaming, blinking consoles of the ship than they were in paying respect to the uncle they had tied to a tree only a couple of days before.

Then there were the close friends and colleagues from Voyager and the Enterprise: Seven of Nine, Chakotay, Deanna Troi, Jorak, the Delaneys. The EMH, trying to make his bulky holocam as inconspicuous as he could, lest anyone might think its presence reflected anything other than diffident appreciation for a routine ceremony. Last but definitely not least, there was Princess Lissan of Andoria, in her first-year cadet uniform. She was practically bouncing up and down with excitement at being permitted to watch a Captain's instatement so soon into her time with Starfleet. Tom grinned at her fondly, resisting the temptation to greet Her Imperial Highness with the "Hey, Tigger!" he had taken to using whenever she commed him privately for advice.

Tom drew a deep breath. He bounded down the stairs, willing his feet to head for the Captain's chair rather than the conn, and came to attention before Admiral Kathryn Janeway. They looked into each other's eyes for a moment, the memories of seven shared years and a moonlit remembrance of the night before passing silently between them.

He spoke the words, past the sudden catch in his throat.

"I relieve you."

Blinking back a tear, her voice like steel on gravel, Janeway gave the traditional response.

"I am relieved."

She rose and shook Tom's hand, held it a moment longer than perhaps strictly necessary, before stepping aside to let him take the seat that had been hers. With a deep breath, he did.

And felt himself sinking down much lower than he had expected, suppressing an "oof" as gravity conspired to make his landing a lot less dignified than he had hoped.

_Oh, great. First fifteen seconds as Captain, and already landed on my butt._

His former Captain's face cracked into a grin and he glared at her, utterly oblivious to just how much he looked like his father in that moment. _Of course – it was set for her, and she hadn't raised it when getting up. _Harry Kim behind him suppressed a snort.

"You called it last night, Tom," Janeway said sweetly.

_Ah, yes. _He'd called her a bitch – in good sport of course, and they had both laughed about it. But he should have known there'd be repercussions ... The glare in his eyes turned into an appreciative gleam.

"A Captain is always right, ma'am," he said, leaving no doubt as to which Captain he meant. Then with his most gracious smile, he added, for the benefit of the guests on the bridge, "I guess the chair was still set for the children, and the maintenance crew just forgot to readjust it."

For the last two years, Voyager had rested on the grounds of Starfleet Academy, visited by thousands of children who were only to happy to pretend to be Captain of Voyager for a minute, to have their holograph taken, and dream. Janeway bit her lip to stop herself from acknowledging the double riposte, and raised her eyes to the Fleet Admiral, who had been observing the little exchange with her usual frigidly pleasant half-smile.

Nacheyev spoke. "Congratulations, Captain Paris. I understand you have a docking appointment at McKinley now. A berth is reserved. I assume you will want to ensure that the flight window is not missed."

_Now? As in, immediately? With everyone aboard?_

"Err, with all due respect, Voyager doesn't have a crew yet. And … " he almost stumbled over the words, "she … doesn't have a pilot."

"I'm told, Captain, that you _used_ to be a pretty fair pilot yourself," said the woman who had personally signed off on his citation for the Distinguished Flying Cross, her tone pleasantly bland. "And I am not aware, on the other hand, of anyone else I would trust to get this ship out of its current site without inflicting major damage on the surrounding buildings. So, please, do go ahead. Now."

She looked around the bridge, raising an eyebrow. "I'm sure there are a few people here who know how to get a starship off the ground?"

The light dawned on Tom Paris as he watched Picard's eyes glitter, lost in some memory or other, that his father – who was now grinning from ear to ear and nudging his wife with his elbow - had mentioned once or twice the Starfleet tradition of making newly-minted Captains suffer a little on their first day of command, but Tom had hoped Janeway's little ploy with the chair would be it. Or that Harry, Will or B'Elanna would come up with some … more private form of humiliation in the course of the day. He certainly had not expected any hazing rituals to involve the senior admiralty.

Fine. So be it.

"Will?" he turned to his friend and former Captain, gesturing to the First Officer's chair. Riker inclined his head graciously and took the indicated seat after exchanging glances with Chakotay, whose civilian clothing had removed him from consideration for this very special assignment.

"Harry, Ops? B'Elanna, Seven …" The former _Voyager_ officers grinned broadly or, in the case of Seven of Nine, allowed their lips to curl slightly, and took their former stations with practiced ease.

Janeway suppressed a throaty chuckle as Tom Paris tried to peel his long frame out of the Captain's chair with his usual grace, and failed miserably. His centre of gravity was too low and his knees at far too high an angle, and he fell back with an unceremonious _thud_. Casting a wounded look at his wife, who was trying her very hardest not to double over the engineering station in an extremely unKlingon-like giggle fit, he issued a soft command to the computer to adjust the chair, managed to get out of it with some salvaged dignity, and stepped down to the conn.

"Oh, Captain?" Nacheyev's uninflected voice rang across the suddenly silent bridge. "When you landed this ship on the grounds, you made a rather … interesting detour. In the interest of symmetry it would be only fitting if you did so again."

Tom couldn't believe his ears. Was the head of Starfleet seriously inviting him to do a fly-by through the Golden Gate Bridge? Was this some kind of test?

"I believe we were advised last time that proper authorization is required to fly close to a national monument, Admiral," Tom said virtuously, even as his long fingers punched certain commands into the console.

Nacheyev responded crisply and stood a little straighter. "I understand that a flight plan has been filed on your behalf with Bay Area Traffic Control; please proceed."

Harry chimed in from Ops "The skies are clear, _Captain_." There was a little catch in his throat, but he beamed at Tom when his friend turned to look at him, and gave him a private little nod.

Tom shrugged and smiled to himself. Those assurances weren't quite the same things as authorization from the Historical Parks Commission, but … whatever. Following potentially unlawful orders was not always a good thing, but he was prepared to make an exception for this one. Besides, the city was unlikely to argue with the area's major employer and economic powerhouse; in fact, holovids from Voyager's previous fly-by were still for sale in all the tourist stores, earning revenue for the city. Might as well get them updated.

He cracked his knuckles and let his fingers fly over the conn. This felt so good, so right. Captain or no, this was where he belonged …

"Bay Area TC, this is USS Voyager. Taking off in five … four … three … two … ONE. We have lift-off."

As lightly as anything could with a dead weight of eighty-five thousand tonnes of metal, Voyager lifted off the grass and straight up into the morning sky. She cleared the surrounding academy buildings with ease, although Tom felt briefly tempted to vent some plasma into the bright pink mess building, which in his considered opinion was guilty of serving more botched meals and indigestible coffee-like substances than a thousand Neelixes. Cadets would erect monuments in his honour…

With an ostentatious – and utterly unnecessary – flourish of the wrist he moved the ship into position, heading straight to the Golden Gate Bridge.

"Five hundred meters, vector 179 Mark 8," Seven announced from her station in her flat alto voice.

"Target acquired," Harry could not resist tossing into the room. Tom broke out in a grin and dipped his ship's nose down, and up.

He knew he was not imagining the little gasp emanating from Admiral Nacheyev – _did she really just pump her fist?_ - nor the little whoop coming from the normally staid Bullock, as the metal cable stays slid by at either side of the wide-angled view screen. Picard and Janeway clapped loudly, and were joined in the applause by everyone else on the bridge. Having cleared the obstacle, and studiously ignoring the frantic hails from Bay Area Traffic Control – _flight plan, my ass_ - Tom turned around in his seat and grinned at his audience.

_So, that was what this was really about, all this brass onboard. _A chance for a bunch of senior admirals to go on a gratuitous joyride, like a gang of teenagers on a Saturday night. Based on what he knew of his father, opportunities to let loose got fewer and fewer, the higher one climbed up the food chain; Tom supposed that someone like Alynna Nacheyev could probably only ever let go anymore in the privacy of her shower. He found himself unaccountably pleased that he had been able to bring a little levity into the Ice Queen's day.

"Arriving at McKinley," Harry announced. "Cleared to dock at berth Beta Fifteen."

A few minutes later, the duranium arches of the station had opened their embrace, and the ship docked smoothly. Within minutes, a small fleet of shuttles surrounded her to carry out external hull verification; the business of getting her deep-spaceworthy had begun.

The whisper Janeway gave was for Tom's ears only; she had come up behind him during the short flight into orbit.

"She's back where she belongs. Thank you."

…**..**

_McKinley Station, four weeks later_

During his mid-teen _Sturm und Drang_ period, just before his rebellious streak started express itself in illicit shuttle adventures and raids of his father's wine cellar, the Admiral's son had looked – very briefly - to find himself in the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche. The infatuation had died a silent and ignominious death when the man's syntax got too complex, the words too long and he started rambling on about the idea of a "superman" - pretty much what Tom had been trying to get away _from _at the time. But the title of the first piece he'd read (and the only one he had actually finished) had stayed with him: 'The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music.'

And so Captain Paris, in finest procrastination mode, found himself mentally drafting a treatise on "The Birth of a Starship from the Spirit of Bureaucracy". Or was it "The Rise of a Captain from the Grave of Common Sense"? He ran his hand through his sandy hair for the umpteenth time, wishing the PADD in front of him would either go away altogether, or at least tell him what decisions to make. Multiple choice responses would be nice, with a melodious little _ping_ to reward him when he got something right.

But even though Nietzsche had been dead for over half a millennium, there were still no supermen, and Tom was forced to operate in the real world. As a result, any decision he attempted to make inevitably ran into some regulation or other, and some supercilious – and usually über-Vulcan – bureaucrat informing him politely that "I regret to inform you that this _cannot_ be done, Captain Paris."Thus spake Starfleet.

Being a Captain in the Alpha Quadrant, Tom decided as he wrecked his hair, was ninety percent administration, nine percent protocol, and one percent action. He was still awaiting his first formal assignment, having been given six weeks to staff up and make sure Voyager was space-worthy after two years on the ground.

The last part was the reason he hadn't seen much of his wife recently. She and Sue Nicoletti, her freshly-appointed Deputy, had gone over every centimetre of the ship. Following her promotion to full lieutenant, Sue had decided it was time to get back into space, and had practically crashed their door when _Voyager_'s recommissioning was announced. Tom was convinced the two women were greeting each gelpack, each bio-neural circuit by name, like old friends with secret handshakes. So far so good; the ship seemed in excellent shape and her first shakedown flights had gone above expectations well.

Staffing, on the other hand, was the stuff of nightmares. Will Riker had made it perfectly clear that there would be no further poaching of his senior staff. No matter how happy he was for his friends, the Captain of the _Enterprise_ felt mildly aggrieved that he was losing _both_ his XO _and_ Chief Engineer, after little over a year. The departure of Harry Kim, whom Tom was eying for first or second officer, would have to involve his decomposing corpse. Maybe in a year's time someone could come knocking on his ship's hull again, but for now he had given at the office.

Harry himself had been sorely tempted to push his Captain to release him from his assignment. He was in line for a promotion to Lieutenant Commander in any event, so that was not the attraction to move. But as he had explained to Libby, he couldn't really imagine serving without his best friends anymore. It was Tom himself who had rationalized that they both might just benefit from the absence of, respectively, their moral crutch and their Big Brother, at least for a while.

"Besides," Tom had told Harry with his trademark grin, "If I want to be a Real Captain, I'll probably need some time where everybody on board at least _pretends_ to respect me."

Riker had, however, grudgingly allowed Mike Ayala's departure, once Tom had learned just how much of a poker game staffing negotiations actually were and that even a newly-minted Captain was not entirely without cards. A full Lieutenant now, he had gone to pack his bags as soon as Tom offered him the position of Chief of Security. With both sons now in the academy and his wife having moved on around the time the Hirogen trashed _Voyager_, Mike was perfectly content to stay in space. He had never asked for nor expected the career he found himself in now, but had discovered in it a source of profound pride and satisfaction. His outward response to Tom's offer had been seven words and a shrug, "Back on _Voyager_? Sure. Count me in." Tom had missed what the Enterprise's empathic counselor, who was present, did not: A deep sense of pleasure, and a promise. Mike Ayala would follow his new Captain anywhere.

Not that there was a shortage of qualified personnel applying for a posting on the newly re-commissioned ship. The name _Voyager_ was deeply ingrained in Starfleet lore already, second seemingly only to the _Enterprise_ herself; and much to his amazement Tom found that his captaincy seemed not to have turned people off too much.

He felt himself extraordinarily flattered that Tuvok had commended his own daughter, Lieutenant Commander Asil, to his attention for the position of Ops officer, and had hired her on the spot. Asil had started and completed her academy training, as well as a first assignment, while her father was still in the Delta Quadrant – not that the intensely private Commander, now an instructor at the Academy, had ever mentioned that fact after the letters started arriving.

Tom had also been more than gratified to see applications from a surprising number of ex-Voyager crewmembers, as well as from one Ensign Arno Schmidt. Decisions were easy in those cases; getting the transfers actually approved was quite another matter though.

Even the approval for B'Elanna to resume her position as Chief Engineer proved to be tricky. The issue of her being 'the Captain's wife' was resolved by recourse to precedent (after all, the flagship held such a couple). But then some helpful spark decided to become concerned for B'Elanna's career, given that she would return to the same position she had occupied for seven years as a mere Lieutenant (jg) – clearly a step backwards. It took B'Elanna herself, in full Klingon mode, to convince the well-meaning personnel officer that said Lieutenant Commander didn't _give a tinker's damn_ – the actual language she used was far more colourful - _where_ she served, as long as she could run her own engine room and go home to quarters containing her husband and child.

And so it went. Finally, in desperation, Tom had asked his father if he could borrow Nicole for a couple of weeks.

The queen of personal assistants, Nicole was pure duranium under a plush coating. Indeed, her grandmotherly appearance and demeanour hid a mind like a bank of lasers, and no one who knew her doubted that she would have been capable of joining the admiralty herself had she chosen that path. She specialized in stunning hapless bean counters with obscure regulations that she quoted off the top of her head, most of which, Tom had always suspected, she had either made up entirely or 'amended' (temporarily) by hacking into Starfleet's central data bank. She achieved in two days what he had failed to do in three weeks, and but for the certain knowledge that his father would kill him, he would have happily offered her a permanent job as protocol troubleshooter.

In rapid succession, Nicole freed Lieutenant Pablo Baytart from the shackles of a three-year assignment on the _USS Mark Twain _to become Voyager's chief pilot; discovered that there were in fact_ no_ regulations prohibiting the presence of family members or small school units on Intrepid-class ships (and contracted a civilian teacher the same day); and cut Schmidt's post-PTSD med clearance loose from a Gordian knot's worth of red tape.

And when the Auxiliary Crafts Division had laconically informed her that _Voyager _was 147th on the Fleet waiting list to receive one of the new Delta Flyer models, she blandly reminded Tom that it was the Captain's prerogative to bring a personal yacht onboard. A few short hours later, the Delta Flyer 2 was in the shuttle bay where she belonged, and Owen and Julia wistfully stared at a colourful play structure as the only remaining tangible evidence that children never really leave home.

Thanks to Hurricane Nicole, the stack of "to-do" PADDs before Tom had flattened significantly. Her major achievements of the morning had been to convince Accommodations to replace the mint-gelato upholstery Janeway had been stuck with for seven years – and which had suffered from two years of being fingered and sat on by tourists of varying size and cleanliness - with something in a warm blue-grey, and to get them to refrain from re-converting Neelix' kitchen into the standard-issue Captain's dining room. Tom had promised Chell that he could resume his short career as Voyager's on-board chef, since the little 'Delta Quadrant Qoffee Qorner' he had opened on Bolarus IX hadn't really caught on. Even with unlimited access to replicators, Tom thought the crew would appreciate the occasional meal prepared from scratch by a sociable individual.

But despite all the achievements of the last few days, two key positions remained to be filled – Chief Medical Officer and the all-important position of Executive Officer. And thus it was that Tom was sitting in the Captain's … his … ready-room, ruining his shortly-cropped hair with desperate hands.

The selection of XO he had little control over. First-time Captains were given no choice in the matter; even strong hints dropped on Owen Paris, in the hope that his father's influence still counted for something, had been useless. All Tom could do was sit and pray that he'd get as lucky as Picard had when his XO had been dropped on him by The Powers That Be. And fret, in case he wouldn't be.

But even when it came to deciding on a CMO, which was a matter for his own decision, Tom's own medical background had proven more a hindrance than a benefit. He found himself rejecting candidate after prospective candidate for perceived deficiencies, ranging from lack of experience in the use of nanoprobe technology to testimony of 'most charming' bedside manners. And so, he kept going over PADD after PADD, no longer looking for a CV that would scream "me, me, me!" but one that he could at least live with.

Tom considered comming his mother, fleeing to the holodeck, checking on Miral in the nursery, or using his executive privilege to try and reach Harry over subspace – anything, really, to get away from having to make a decision that deep in his heart he knew he would regret. But instead of doing any of these things he dutifully turned his attention back to the PADDs before him; his father would doubtless be proud knowing how far his son had come as an officer ...

He nearly wept with gratitude when the door chime sounded.

"Come in," he said eagerly. At this point, even a bureaucrat with ideas for deconstructing the bridge would be welcome… What he got was the EMH, mobile emitter pinned to his sleeve.

"Doc!" Tom exclaimed with an enthusiasm he would, only a few years ago, have considered evidence of an impending mental breakdown. (Perhaps it was?) "What brings you here? Great of you to stop by. I can sure use a timeout here." He clamped his mouth shut when he realized he was coming close to babbling.

The Doc tried to school his features into his usual supercilious manner, but his facial algorithms were affected by an unhelpful interface between old, un-dead habits and the programmed dictates of Starfleet protocol. Clearly, seeing his former assistant sitting in Captain Janeway's ready room as if he belonged there - and having to acknowledge that he _did_ - was almost too much to process, and his forehead twitched a little.

"Good afternoon, Mr. … Captain Paris," he intoned, slightly aggrieved when Tom grinned openly at the fumble. "I came to inquire whether you have filled the position of Chief Medical Officer yet."

Tom brightened visibly, and set his PADD down with a clatter. "No, as a matter of fact, I haven't, and I was just in the process of reviewing personnel files. You're just in time to save my sanity, in fact. Maybe you could help me? By now you must have met most of Starfleet Medical, and …"

"… there is no one even remotely qualified to take over my Sickbay," the Doctor stated flatly. Tom's smile faded as rapidly as it had formed. This was not what he'd been hoping to hear.

"I do, however, have a solution to offer." The EMH paused.

Intrigued, Tom waited for him to continue. "You do? I'm listening."

"Myself."

Tom swallowed, confused. "You? But …" he paused, wondering how to politely rephrase what he'd almost blurted out, namely that _for the last two years you've been bragging to everybody who would listen about how indispensible you are to Starfleet Medical._ Maybe that fourth pip came with a concealed smartass remark dampener?

"… but I thought you were happy at the Academy."

"I was. I … am. But …" the EMH scrunched his lips in a familiar gesture of displeasure mixed with exasperation. "The truth is, I find myself bored. My brief time on the _Enterprise_ showed me that what I miss is being in space, saving lives under extraordinary circumstances." He broke into a beatific smile, his eyes far away, already dwelling on his future achievements.

"The challenge of making new discoveries is far more interesting than talking about past successes, or treatments I have already invented, no matter how brilliant. And besides …"

The Doc was trying to look anywhere but at Tom. Finally, he blurted out, "After your instatement I went to visit Sickbay. And …"

Tom's face softened in an understanding smile. "And you found you'd come home? Welcome to the club."

The Doctor pulled himself together. "Actually, what I was going to say was that I decided I could not, in good conscience, allow you or anyone else to ruin this place. Moreover, knowing you, you and your wife will inevitably find completely new and innovative ways to harm yourselves, and someone will have to look after you and my goddaughter. And so I have asked to be released from my assignment with Starfleet Medical."

"Pretty sure I'd have you, weren't you?"

Try as he may, Tom could not resist needling the Doc – for about fifty nanoseconds. His relief got the better of him, and he got up and on his feet, ready to embrace the solution he had not dared hope for, but knew to be perfect.

"And you'd be right. Welcome back, Doc."

He extended his hand, and seized the Doc's with a firm clasp, confident for once that here was one appointment the bureaucracy could not possibly oppose. If they did, he would sic Nicole on them. _And_ his father. He grinned at the EMH.

"And who knows, maybe in Round Two we'll even find you a name?"

…..


	2. The Mission

**Chapter 2 – The Mission**

_Starfleet Headquarters, San Franscisco_

Tom sat in the waiting area outside Fleet Admiral Nacheyev's office, convinced the chair he was sitting on had been expressly designed to give off the appearance of a warm welcome, while sending the subliminal message that one was only there on tolerance. Even more disconcerting was the feeling that he should apologize each time some junior officer seemed compelled to walk a little straighter at the sight of his four pips. _No really, it's okay, Ensign – it's only me …_

Meetings with Nacheyev were no one's favourite pastime, although the look of glee he had briefly seen flash across her face after _Voyager_'s dip through the Golden Gate Bridge had almost humanized her in Tom's mind, and his past substantive interactions with her had been fairly … positive. He knew rationally, moreover, that she had to be favourably disposed towards him in some way, since she had signed off (perhaps even initiated) his latest, rather precipitous promotion. But none of that seemed to be able to calm the butterflies in his stomach now.

The summons to receive his first assignment, which traditionally came with something akin to a pep talk from senior command, did not particularly bother him. What did force him to sit on his fingers lest he chew them to the quick, though, was that he would also be told who had been assigned to Voyager as his XO. A choice that would be made for him for the foreseeable future, or at least until 'Paris junior' developed the necessary political clout to pick his own Number One. Decisions over which he had no control never sat easily with Tom, and he found himself wondering yet again whether he had made the right choice, embedding himself ever deeper in the strict hierarchy that was Starfleet.

The door opened, and the Fleet Admiral's _aide de camp _waved him inside with a wide, welcoming grin. Jarod Tervellyan and Tom had spent the year in Advanced Strategic and Technical Command training at the Academy together, where they had developed both a great deal of respect for one another and, Tom thought, laid the foundation of a promising friendship. Tom had been looking forward to catching a glimpse of Jarod in the course of this meeting, but even so was slightly taken aback by the warmth of his old class mate's greeting. The last time they had communicated in the line of duty, when the Enterprise had been held hostage by the Andorian fleet, the weight of the Admiral's expectations seemed to have taken at least two inches off Jarod's frame and replaced them with five years of age and a bunch of grey hairs.

So why was he grinning like the proverbial Cheshire Cat now?

"Come in, Captain Paris," the Fleet Admiral's cool voice greeted him. She was seated at a conference table in one corner of her spacious office, a number of PADDs spread out before her. She did not rise to greet her guest, but gestured vaguely towards one of the chairs across the table from her.

"Please have a seat. I believe you know Commander Tervellyan." It was not a question. The woman's memory was legendary (some people even suspected it was _her_ who spoke to them when they activated a Starfleet computer), and Tom was not surprised that she knew of their past association. What made the comment remarkable was that she had made it at all. Alynna Nacheyev never made idle conversation or small talk. Tom's ears pricked up.

Nacheyev wasted no time getting to her point. "You are still in need of a first officer, Captain. I mentioned this fact to Commander Tervellyan last week, and he expressed an interest in the position."

She paused, to watch the effect of her statement on Tom. His eyebrows shot up, and he looked over at Tervellyan, who had remained standing. His grin widened when he saw Tom's mouth open slightly.

It didn't take Tom long to figure out that Nacheyev would not have mentioned his former classmate's interest if it had been academic, and he felt a corresponding grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. He inclined his head slightly in Tervellyan's direction, given that he was clearly not expected to say anything quite yet. Indeed, Nacheyev continued.

"The Commander is on a two-year assignment to my office, but Picard convinced me in conversation some time ago that it would be interesting to put two graduates of the new command training curriculum together. And since you are the first such graduate to receive your own command, Captain, you get to be our guinea pig. And Commander Tervellyan gets an early release from his current assignment."

She cast Tom a long look from under her pale lashes, her lips tightened in a not-quite-smile. He quickly digested the fact that the Ice Queen had just come frighteningly close to making a joke, and that some sort of response would be called for.

"Well, I seem to specialize in taking advantage of early release opportunities," he quipped back, allowing his genuine pleasure in the decision to reflect on his face, before saying the polite words his Starfleet breeding provided easily.

"And I'm sure this one will work out well, too. For everybody – although I'm sure you will miss him, Fleet Admiral. Thank you."

He turned to Tervellyan, extending a hand that was gripped firmly. "Welcome to _Voyager,_ Commander. I look forward … _really_ look forward to working with you."

Nacheyev seemed pleased, although as usual it was hard to tell with her. This particular subject matter having been concluded to her satisfaction, she moved on to the next item on her agenda with brisk efficiency.

"I hear that your ship is ready for deployment, Captain. We have a mission that is ideally suited for you and _Voyager_. Commander?" She nodded at Tervellyan.

Obviously, his First Officer-designate knew something about the nature of the mission already due to his association with the Admiral, a fact that amused Tom far more than it bothered him. He sat back and watched as Tervellyan activated a holoscreen set into the conference table. With a slight buzzing sound, a small point of light expanded into a sphere showing a small cluster of stars, each surrounded by a number of planets. Thanks to the speeded up rotations of the model, their intricate orbits were clearly visible.

"The Snowflakes!" Tom exclaimed involuntarily. Nacheyev inclined her head in silent appreciation of the speed with which he had recognized one of the more obscure corners of the Alpha Quadrant.

The official name of the cluster was the Narov system. Given the sophisticated dance the small stars and planets wove around one another – close enough to move each other in an intricate push-pull of gravimetric forces, but never coming lose to touching, or destabilizing one another's orbit - an early stellar cartographer with a love for Tchaikovsky had christened them after his favourite dance, in his favourite ballet. The system was located just beyond Federation space, off the shoulder of the constellation of Orion - as seen from Earth - but the region was becoming well-travelled due to the metals and minerals found on some of its uninhabited planets and asteroids.

The Narovian Union consisted of a loose central government, with eleven associated planets each subject to their own local administrations. A new, privately-run space station had been set up only recently, thirty light years away and just outside Federation space, in order to service the fast-developing trade routes.

It was no secret - but also not a well-advertised fact - that Starfleet had been making overtures to the Narovian Union with a view to expanding Federation membership. They had been warp capable for over a century, and contacts were regular and relatively amicable, but nothing more. A cold hand gripped Tom's stomach briefly as he contemplated the dire possibility that he was being sent on a diplomatic mission. Surely Nacheyev didn't remember – hadn't meant - what she had said about his supposed diplomatic skills, after his run-in with the Andorian emperor a few months ago?

As if she had read his mind, Nacheyev elaborated. "The mission we have in mind for _Voyager_ is _prima facie _a humanitarian one, Captain Paris. We do hope that it will be followed by formal diplomatic overtures down the road, but right now there are other priorities." She nodded at Tervellyan, who picked up the thread.

"For the last eight months, a major outbreak of the Magellanic blood virus has been spreading across the Narov system. So far it has affected six of the eleven planets, here," he pointed at the six most centrally located worlds. "The Union and local governments have been unable to synthesize enough medication to inoculate the population of the remaining five, let alone to provide treatment for those who are affected. Given the extent of interplanetary trade and dependency within the system, the disease is virtually impossible to contain. A quarantine has slowed it down a bit, but the Union has turned to the Federation for help."

Nacheyev smiled, a genuine smile this time that touched her pale eyes. "The Council apparently listened carefully to what you and Will Riker said when you were challenged for leaving Dr. Fincher in the Trifid nebula. The amount of goodwill generated by a genuine humanitarian gesture can never be underestimated. Accordingly, Starfleet has been ordered to provide assistance."

A humanitarian gesture that bought goodwill. Friendship, with happened to no-strings-attached decency? But despite his reflexive cynicism, Tom had to admit to himself that someone getting access to medication for his kids probably wouldn't care a great deal whether the Federation incidentally scored political brownie points off their survival.

At least would not be expected to shake hands, make nice over canapés, and come back with a signed application for Federation membership – that was a relief. But what he _was_ being asked to do left a number of questions, which, being Tom Paris, he wasn't shy to ask.

"If Starfleet wants to send a shipment of medical supplies, why not send a couple Whorfin class ships? They have much bigger cargo holds than Voyager. Or if it's speed and results you're looking for, rather than volume, wouldn't one of the mobile hospitals be more useful? We're as fast as they are, but they have the additional equipment and trained personnel."

His eyes darted from the Admiral to her EA, looking for a visual clue as to whether he had just asked a smart question, or by overtly questioning the Admiral's judgment, condemned himself to patrolling the outer rim of the Coalsack for the rest of his career.

Apparently, it was the former.

"Good questions, Captain, if aid delivery was the primary goal of your mission. The fact is, we sent three transports to the Snowflakes already. They arrived six weeks ago, but we have been unable to verify that the antigen they carried was actually distributed by the central medical authorities. Receipt was acknowledged from the coordinates we were given by the authorities for beam-down, but we have been unable to verify that any of it reached the population centres for which it was intended." Nacheyev took a short breath, and looked at Tervellyan to continue.

"Those same sources initially confirmed that there had been no noticeable impact on the spread of the disease, and no reduction in the number of active cases. Simply put, we have been unable to trace the medication. The containers we might have been able to locate, but the anti-viral agent is contained in small vials that need to be diluted in order to be administered in the numbers required. Once that has happened – there's no way to track it. We initiated a more in-depth investigation of the various contact points but took a burn on our contacts almost immediately after the orders went out. There's been no word since."

Tervellyan turned to Nacheyev, and the two officers exchanged a quick and somber look. _We took a burn._ There were names attached to that phrase, lives cut short. Families that would never see their loved one again. Tom swallowed, his throat suddenly dry. He'd been there, undercover. Knew the risks. He hoped the agents died believing they had sacrificed themselves for the sake of the civilians who went untreated, not for advancing the Federations expansionist agenda.

He knew where he would put his emphasis, if asked.

"You figure the antigen has been deliberately diverted, to - what did they use to call this? - the black market?" As far as Tom was concerned, corruption ranked only slightly behind assimilation among the things he would gladly devote his life to eradicating from the Quadrant. And when it played with the lives of children … "I suppose there's a lot of money to be made from people desperate enough for medication."

Nacheyev nodded, and gave him a calculating look. "Indeed, that would be a logical conclusion. Needless to say, even using official channels it has been very difficult to follow up once the deliveries were made; the whole system is under quarantine."

"Understood," Tom said. His mission was indeed crystallizing. He smiled a little. "You want us for our powers of observation."

Voyager had highly advanced telemetry, thanks to the Borg enhancements Seven of Nine had installed in the astrometrics lab. Starfleet engineers had been busily trying to copy the instruments and calibrations, but he knew from B'Elanna that those attempts had been only partially successful to date; Voyager remained the best-equipped ship in the fleet for long-range observation and sensing. The Prometheus class ships, Starfleet's latest toys, had been developed more for their advanced propulsion and tactical systems than their ability to detect, say, far-off wormholes or interstellar probes; Voyager's sophistication in this area remained unique.

Nacheyev's lips curled upward. "I am glad you understand your assignment so quickly, Captain. Needless to say, even if we don't expect you to go to ground in the Snowflakes, this project has to remain highly classified. We have no knowledge how deep the … potential network behind the diversion extends."

Tom's mind was already in problem-solving mode. "And needless to say, whoever is behind the diversion, is probably just as aware of the Federation's interests as the Council, and may well be intent on sabotaging the rapprochement between us and the Narovian leadership."

Nacheyev nodded her approval and rose, having exhausted her agenda. She saw no need to get involved in operational details; the Ice Queen had ascended through the ranks in part thanks to her ability to delegate effectively, and was known to pull on the reins or issue detailed directions only when she took a personal interest in the matter.

"You will have forty-eight hours to load the medication and prepare for Voyager's departure. Good luck, Captain Paris. We look forward to your report."

She held Tom's eyes only long enough to comply with the basic dictates of courtesy, before turning her attention to one of the PADDs on the table before her. He understood the dismissal as clearly as if it had been articulated and rose crisply to his feet, nodding at Tervellyan as he did so.

The Commander followed him out, as Tom had hoped.

Once they were alone, Tom bridged the momentary awkwardness with a broad smile. They were friends - albeit not close - but professional respect came first, and lines needed to be established quickly. An observer of the relationship between Janeway and Chakotay, and a conscious participant in his own dealings with Will Riker, he thought he knew how. His voice, when it came, was all business, despite the friendly overlay that coloured it.

"So, I trust you're available to report for duty immediately, Commander?"

Jarod responded with a sharp nod, and a smile of his own. He understood the game as well as Tom.

"Aye, Captain. I've been relieved as of tomorrow. I need to get some things together, but should be able to report to the ship at fourteen hundred Standard Time. Is that acceptable?"

"It certainly is. I'll make sure your quarters are ready." Tom hesitated for a moment. "I assume you're still … single?"

The question was not asked out of curiosity, but in order to determine how the First Officers quarters would need to be configured. Tervellyan clearly understood that, although a brief shadow crossed his face. His break-up with his wife of six years had been headline news at the Kirk Centre; while he had been protective of the details, the wide-spread assumption was that a prolonged period of togetherness had not worked particularly well, for two people used to spending long months on their own.

"Yeah," he answered. "I am." He brightened a little, and an impish smile crossed his features and lit up his dark eyes. "Bachelor life isn't all bad, though, I gotta admit. Being off the leash definitely has its plus sides."

Tom snorted, and matched his new XO's light tone. "Just remember, the Chief Engineer is off limits, and there are certain rules in other respects … Alright, see you tomorrow. And Jarod – I'm really glad to have you. Really glad, and especially hearing that you asked for the assignment. That means a lot."

He held out his hand again, and Tervellyan shook it solemnly.

_This might almost work out, _Tom thought to himself as he left Central Command.

…..

Tom felt close to whistling even as his mind started to play out scenarios for the mission. Sure, Voyager had her sophisticated sensor technology, and whatever equipment had been overtaken by developments during her seven years in the Delta Quadrant had long been replaced. But monitoring distribution networks required a little more than a good toolkit and powers of observation. If he could only figure out a way to tag the antigen itself, so that it could be traced even after it was dispensed…

"Captain Paris."

The well-known voice cut across the quadrangle as clear as a bell, almost in answer to his musing. Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct to Unimatrix Zero One, née Annika Hansen, had no difficulty at all competing with the wind blowing in from the Bay.

Tom stopped in his tracks, a slow smile stealing across his face. He turned towards the owner of the voice, without a trace of annoyance at the imperiousness with which she had sought to command his attention. She was what she was.

"Hey, _Lieutenant Seven_," he said jovially, stressing each word. He'd seen her wince uncomfortably – still - anytime someone called her Hansen, even though that was now her official designation, and by her own choice. His off-handed thoughtfulness was rewarded with a small smile. All the same, he knew it would be useless to ask her to call him Tom; she never had when they were onboard together – why would she change now?

"Fancy meeting you here."

The long, panther-like strides of the former Borg drone took her to his side in a matter of seconds. Tom absorbed the sight of her Starfleet uniform, the blue of the science track peeking through the grey jacket. There were two pips on her collar - one black, one gold. She had breezed through the Academy in record time as expected, and in recognition of her service on _Voyager_ been permitted to graduate with a lieutenancy rather than the common ensign status.

Officially only a junior teacher, Seven was already leaving her mark on the astrophysics faculty and her lectures were surreptitiously attended by many of the senior staff.

"Our meeting was not a coincidence," she responded matter-of-factly. "I had heard you would be receiving your orders this week, and entered an alert for your bio signs into the transport from McKinley station."

"You hacked into the transport system just to know when I'd be coming to San Francisco?" Tom was a little incredulous. "If you wanted to see me or meet me for coffee, why not just comm me?"

"I thought it might be pleasant to surprise you," she said simply. "You have always sought to convince me of the value of spontaneity in human relationships, and I wished to demonstrate the effectiveness of your lessons."

Tom heroically refrained from pointing out that being alerted to his presence via his bio signs was, perhaps, a fair ways from anyone's understanding of spontaneity, but he had certainly been surprised, so he let it go.

"Well," he said, "whatever - here we are, then, and I'm certainly glad to see you, Seven. Would you like to go for a coffee, or do you not require a caffeinated beverage at this time?"

"A cup of Vulcan tea would be pleasant, thank you," Seven responded with something like a smile. She sure had loosened up in the last couple of years, Tom mused – up to a point, anyway, when he found himself scrambling to follow as she unceremoniously stalked away towards the civilian promenade.

At his suggestion, they headed to a small café, known to be a favourite hangout for those working at Starfleet Command. When they were seated, Tom studied his erstwhile crewmate over the rim of his cup.

"So, what's up? How's Chakotay? And why the sudden interest in seeing me?"

They had met a number of times over the course of the last year when the Enterprise had docked at McKinley, and of course Seven and Chakotay had been present at his instatement at Captain of _Voyager_. But the majority of their encounters had been in the context of crew reunions or gatherings; social events were not high on Seven's list of priorities and Chakotay had been content to dive into his new calling to the exclusion of nearly all else. Their most direct one-on-one interaction had been in respect of Icheb, whom Seven had recommended for a three-month-long, semester-break practicum onboard Voyager. Since Tom was only too aware of the young man's qualifications and had not yet managed to fill the astrometrics position, he had gladly agreed.

But now, at Tom's direct question about her reasons for this encounter, Seven seemed uncharacteristically at a loss for words. Finally, though, she took his measure with her clear gaze. For the umpteenth time, Tom found himself wondering what exactly (and how much) she saw through the ocular implants hidden behind those cool blue eyes. Did she have X-ray vision, and could see past his uniform? Had she seen Harry's short-lived romantic interest in her - or his own suspicion at this sudden engineered encounter - as bright red streaks, or green flashes, in their cerebral cortex?

"Chakotay is fine, thank you. He is developing a series of lectures on the anthropological response of non-telepaths to those with telepathic or empathic powers, using the Devorian Empire as a case study. But I wanted to ask you a question, Captain," she said, with her usual determination and a complete absence of any contemplation that she might be denied.

Seven ploughed on. "Why do you believe you were promoted so quickly? Commander Tuvok has considerable seniority over you, and unlike you has never been decommissioned, imprisoned, demoted or put on trial for breaches of Starfleet procedure."

Boy, oh boy. Trust Seven of Nine to put her fingers on the very question that, only the night before, B'Elanna had caught him mulling over while staring at the ceiling in their bed. He supposed he should be grateful that Seven had posed it over coffee, rather than blurting it out on the bridge in front of half the Fleet's brass at his instatement.

B'Elanna, when he had asked her, had traced his sandy eyebrows with her thumb, smiling at his doubts. "From what I've seen, Starfleet has pretty good bullshit detectors when it comes to appointing captains," she had said softly. "The only real dud I ever met was Ransom, and I'm sure he wasn't like that before he got flung into the Delta Quadrant, or someone would have noticed. You've been there and back, through all sorts of stuff before and after, and from what I can see you've got it together now more than ever. That counts for a lot, and I guess they figured that out."

Tom turned his thoughts back to the present, and looked at Seven thoughtfully.

_Tuvok. _The Vulcan had sent him a very clipped, very precise congratulatory note on his appointment. Needless to say, it had contained not an ounce of resentment at having been leapfrogged by someone a hundred and twenty-odd years his junior, and with a two or three decades less active service in Starfleet. By all accounts, Tuvok had found Tom's elevation … logical. Heck, he had sent him his daughter. Talk about _counts for a lot._

Tom chewed on his lower lip for a bit, before responding. "Well, Seven, to tell you the truth, I've been trying to figure that out myself. But if I understand what I've been told correctly, my appointment is … kind of an experiment. Starfleet has found, during the Dominion War but even before, that the type of people they _used_ to promote were generally very good at following protocol, but not so good at coming up with creative solutions to unforeseen problems."

He chuckled ruefully. "And as you've been fond of pointing out a few times over the years, I do tend to be pretty … _erratic_ the way I tend to look at things. I guess they're hoping that might translate into new perspectives, and new ideas for Starfleet. I hope they're right, 'cause otherwise I'll just end up before another court martial. Beyond that – your guess is as good as mine. But I _can_ tell you that Tuvok himself didn't seem to be particularly surprised, or bothered by my promotion."

Seven gave the matter some thought. "So Starfleet is considering unpredictability and illogical responses to crisis situations as valuable traits? Interesting."

How could he possibly respond to that, without incriminating himself? But before Tom could try, Seven deprived him of the necessity.

"I assume they can be, provided these qualities are combined with at least an element of common sense, which I believe you do possess."

He almost inhaled his tea, and his shoulders began to shake with silent, suppressed laughter at the … what was it? A compliment? Oh Lord - Harry would appreciate hearing about this conversation … But Seven wasn't done with him yet.

"You see, I have been reading up on the necessary qualities for successful leadership, in preparation for my own future career with Starfleet," she explained in all seriousness. "Given my obvious intellectual superiority, a switch to command track is something I should consider."

Clearly, Seven had spent too much time with the Doc ... But then she surprised him.

"However, one of the necessary qualifications I appear to lack is the ability to make people … like me, and this seems to be a required criterion for effective leadership. Would you concur with that, Captain Paris?"

Tom sought refuge in his tea for a minute. A mug of Earl Grey was good for many things, he had found out; granting its holder the ability to rag the puck for a minute – to use a metaphor from his second-favourite winter sport - had to rank in the top three. After swirling the amber liquid around in the cup for a bit, blowing on it and taking a delicate sip, he decided honesty was the best policy, especially since Seven was not likely to take offence.

"Well, truthfully, you're an acquired taste, Seven," he replied with a smile. "A taste I happen to have acquired, although your directness _does_ take some getting used to. But as for the need for a good leader to be liked – well, let me tell you something. There were certainly times, including on _Voyager_ - when people couldn't stand being on the same ship with me. When I first came onboard, and after the Captain gave me my field commission, most of them hated my guts. The Maquis thought I'd betrayed them, and the Fleeters thought I was a waste of my father's DNA. I'm not sure when or how that changed. But I also know there are still a lot of people in Starfleet who don't think I should be where I am."

He unconsciously ran his fingers over the four pips on his collar, and took a deep breath. "Truth be told, I'm not convinced that being liked, or likeable, necessarily makes someone a good commanding officer. I think the real key is respect. And you command _that_ in spades. You just need to stop pissing people off by playing up your - however undeniable - superiority at critical moments, and swatting down others' views as 'irrelevant'. Once you eliminate that attitude and that word from your vocabulary, people will look past what they think they hear, to what it is you're actually telling them, and things should look up."

Seven looked at him thoughtfully, and Tom was reminded of nothing so much as the Admiral in whose company he had just spent half an hour. If the Ice Queen could parlay the emotional depths of a table top into the highest office in Starfleet, what in the universe would stop Seven?

"Thank you," the subject of his contemplation said simply, accepting the honesty of his response as the tribute to their friendship that it was. "I will think about what you have told me."

She made to rise, the conversation being over as far as she was concerned, when something occurred to Tom. He held out his hand.

"Wait a sec, Seven," he said. "Before you leave. Can I ask _you _something in return?"

"Certainly, Captain," she responded politely. "It seems only fair."

He chuckled. "It's not a personal question, just something … rather technical I've been wondering about. And you know my limitations in that field. So here goes. If you were asked to identify a specific antigen across a long distance, is there anything in Borg technology that might make that possible? I mean, antigens and immunogens are microscopic, and any diluting agent in which they're suspended could be easily replaced, so marking that is no good. So the way I see it, it's the immunogen itself one would need to tag to be sure, right? Could you do something like that, for example, with nanoprobes?"

Seven gave him a calculating look, but to his relief, made no specific inquiries, which he would not have been able to answer. She may be naïve in her approach to interpersonal relations, but she had now had her Starfleet training and understood the constraints of mission security.

"Yes," she said simply, before giving the answer he had _really_ wanted, and hoped, to hear. "The Doctor will be able to assist. If it is important, I am willing to provide you with specimen nanoprobes. I believe the Doctor has developed a method for replication, but you would still require a certain minimum quantity."

Tom smiled his genuine gratitude – both at the generous offer, and the discrete manner in which it had been made, no questions asked. Some friendships might seem odd to outsiders, but they were worth their weight in latinum.

"You're the best, Seven, thanks a zillion. I'll have the Doc contact you later today; we leave on mission within the next 48 hours." Tom paused, and gazed at her fondly. "And you know what? What you just offered, and how, is exactly the sort of thing that makes people respect you. Just give yourself some time in Starfleet, and everybody will see that, get to know the real you. Surely, if they can accept me, accepting you will be … a cinch."

He let the thought trail away, and they took their leave of each other with the silent nods of people who understood one another very well indeed.

But all intended discretion aside, Tom did break out into his broadest grin as he headed back towards the public transporter. He might not _feel_ like a captain yet, but at least the mission was off to a good start.


	3. Trade Winds

**Chapter 3 – Trade Winds**

_Deep Space_

Tom strode into Sickbay with the unthinking, unconscious grace bestowed by a body that remembered walking the same steps, taking the same turns, a thousand times. Sometimes he wondered whether that was how an android felt, or a standard hologram – implementing hard-wired, routine motions without need for sensory or emotional input, reactions and choices dictated by internal decision trees that depended solely on turns in the corridor.

The part of his mind that was freed up in this manner considered idly whether he could eliminate from those same internal subroutines the slight feeling of … wariness that he still felt whenever he was heading towards Sickbay. Was there a switch he could throw, to change his internal operating mode from that of _Lieutenant/Ensign Paris, Mere Medic_ to that of _Captain Thomas E. Paris_? He sure hoped that one of these days he'd locate it.

He nodded politely at the Betazoid nurse, Mylana Tval, whose own Fleet-bred response caused her to stand a little straighter at her Captain's approach, and headed for the station where the EMH was bent over an electro-microscope aimed at a small dish. Given the substance the Doctor was working with, the section was cut off from the rest of the room by the sparkle of a containment field that Tom was careful not to approach too closely.

"How're you making out, Doc?" he asked by way of greeting. The EMH had taken to his tasking rather eagerly, despite the fact that it had come from Tom Paris. He had been gratifyingly indignant at the thought that medical supplies might be withheld from those who would use them for their personal profit; the challenge of finding new and innovative was to use nanoprobes had been a bonus.

The EMH looked up at the sound of his voice, fixed him with the brief, principled glare he reserved for anyone who interrupted him, regardless of rank, but pride in his accomplishment quickly outweighed his indignation.

"I am pleased to announce that we appear to have been successful, Mr. Par… Captain."

Tom suppressed a grin. Apparently he wasn't the only one with difficulties to let go of old subroutines. The Doc frowned a little, but it was impossible to tell whether it was due to his slip, or the fact that his former assistant's sudden and meteoric rise through Starfleet ranks had made the correction necessary.

"Here, let me show you."

The EMH asked the computer to transmit the image from the microscope onto the larger view screen on the wall, which filled with a heaving mass of individual cells. The cells resolved into even a higher magnification that Tom recognized as simple DNA strands.

"I was inspired by the technology used by those alien so-called scientists we met in the Delta Quadrant. You will doubtless remember them for their rather successful stimulation of certain human hormones … _Captain_."

The Doctor gave a brief, smug smile, which only intensified when his keen visual receptors detected evidence of Tom's facial capillaries widening. He took considerable pleasure watching the new Captain's treacherously fair skin start to glow in a slight flush, occasioned by a flood of memories that were as embarrassing as they were doubtlessly pleasant.

"You will recall that at the time we determined that Starfleet technology lacked the sophistication to duplicate the tags these aliens placed on the DNA sequences of Voyager's crew members. But thanks to my extensive studies of Borg nanoprobes since that time, I was able to mark the antigen in a similar manner. The tag can be detected with multi-phasic scans, at a frequency that we should be able to encrypt against outside discovery."

"That's great, Doc, Ensign." Tom's appreciative smile included Ensign Tval, who had doubtlessly done a great deal of the spadework in her own quiet, unobtrusive manner. Tom had found her the perfect foil for the EMH, effective and efficient and - thanks to her endlessly patient Betazoid heritage - quite possibly the only organic being besides Kes and Seven of Nine who had ever been able to spend extended periods of time in the Doc's presence without feeling the overwhelming urge to decompile his matrix, or at the very least turn him off. No matter how happy Tom was to have the EMH back on Voyager, that particular impulse still kicked in after, oh, about ten minutes in the hologram's presence.

Tval nodded her acknowledgement of the shared credit with a warm smile. "We should be ready to mark all the containers before we enter the Narov system, sir," she responded. "With your permission, I will request Commander Tervellyan to detail personnel to this task."

Tom found himself suddenly hesitant. Did he really want other crewmembers to know about this? What if it didn't work? _Novice Captain's First Bright Idea A Complete Dud! _He could hear the mess hall chatter now …

He swallowed and shook his head, frantically casting about for an excuse that did not involve exposing his own … _Fine, call a spade a spade, Paris_: _Your fear of failure._

"Thank you, Tval, but I think I'd like to keep this one just between us medical types, for now. Nanoprobe technology is still pretty sensitive for most people. No need to squick anyone, so I'd be grateful if you could do the dispersal of tagged antigens yourself. I assume you'll only need to mark a few antigens per container to enable tracking, so the volume shouldn't be too daunting."

The EMH looked at him curiously, but shrugged and said nothing. His own experience at Starfleet Medical certainly had confirmed that many people, including highly-trained and forward-looking medical professionals, reacted with ill-disguised horror when he described some of the uses to which he had put nanoprobes in past treatments. In fact, it had been a source of considerable disappointment to him when the innovations on which he had hoped to build his own monument in the medical profession had received little applause, meeting instead with uncomfortable silence and stares. Clearly, the idea of introducing Borg technology into the medical vocabulary and toolkit of the Federation was doomed to face as many challenges as the introduction of genetically modified foods had in the twentieth century, until the latter's use had become a matter of worldwide food security.

Tom, in turn, had counted on the Doctor's silence. Glad his diversion tactic had worked and that the ship's medical staff would not second-guess his hesitation to advertise their little plan, he smiled in relief.

"So that's settled then. Carry on, and thanks."

He turned on his heel, suffused by a momentary sense of pure, juvenile pleasure at being able to simply walk out on the Doc without so much as a by-your-leave.

There were, in fact, moments when it was _nice_ to be the Captain.

…..

"Well, so far so good," Tom said nonchalantly as he crawled into bed beside his not-quite-comatose mate. It was clear from his tone that he hoped for an answer, even if he had not exactly posed a question.

"Hmmm?" B'Elanna mumbled sleepily and rolled over, opening one of her eyes. "Finally decided to come to bed, _Captain, sir?"_

Tom punched his pillow into just the right shape, doubling it up to raise his head, so he could observe her better. He never did tire of looking at her face, awake or asleep; halfway in between, as she was now, was another favourite view.

"Engines are running as smoothly as a baby's bottom; Baytart managed not to crash us into Jupiter Station and went to warp _almost _on the dot; the Doc has only pissed off two crewmembers so far and the experiment I asked him to do before we headed out is going well; Ayala and Schmidt are getting on like a house on fire; Tervellyan already got an eyebrow rise out of Asil – it took me _months_ to get one of those out of her father - and Chell actually served real coffee. Life … is good, I think."

This time it was clear to even a semi-conscious B'Elanna that she was expected to provide a substantive response, and that it would be useless to pretend she was falling asleep again when her husband was going a parsec a minute. She opened her eyes, and quirked her lips at the intensity of his stare, the expectant sparkle in his blue eyes – not unlike Miral, when she had successfully put her puzzle back together.

"You forgot to add that our offspring only escaped the nursery once, _and_ was stopped before she got all the way to the bridge. I thought that was pretty good, too."

"Oh yes, how could I forget. She seems to like Emily well enough though, and is probably just testing what she can get away with." He paused a little. "Like me, I guess."

_Ah. There it was_. B'Elanna was fully awake now. "You're still having doubts about that Captain thing? Let me tell you, you _are_ getting away with it, Tom Paris." She grinned at him evilly. "You have the engineering team fooled, anyway."

The right answer, or as close to it as anyone could reasonably come.

Tom flipped himself on top of his mate with practiced ease, bracing his weight on his elbows. "Hey. I'm allowed to be horribly insecure. It's my trademark. You, on the other hand, are supposed to be supportive and reassuring. You'll pay for that remark, _Commander_."

She reached up to cradle his neck, and ran her fingers through his hair. "Seems I'm supporting you now, _Captain,_" she purred as she pulled his head down for a deep kiss, and an effective end to any further conversation.

…..

_Twelve Days Later_

Nemoth II, one of the more outlying of the eleven habitable planets that circled the suns of the Narov System, loomed blueish-green in the viewscreen. Its two main continents were hidden under the massive weather systems that were typical for the planet during this part of its eccentric orbit, when the complicated dance of the Snowflakes wreaked its gravitational havoc most noticeably. Sensors had indicated strong interferences along the entirety of the EM spectrum, and transport of the immunogen that would prevent a further spread of the disease had been delayed by several hours already.

Both Narov quarantine rules and Starfleet protocol prevented the landing of shuttlecraft within the system – except in emergencies - while the pandemic remained active. In fact, the orbit around the planet was crowded with vessels, mostly commercial, awaiting their turn for transport slots to send their wares to the surface, and waiting for the quarantine to lift so they could pick up what goods they had come to load into their empty holds. Interplanetary commerce in the region had slowed to a trickle, and Tom was glad that humanitarian deliveries took precedence. This was one queue he was not sorry to jump.

"Lieutenant Asil," Tom said to his Ops officer, "Can we establish a comm link to the Central Medical Authorities now?"

The Lieutenant's ebony fingers flew over the instruments that had once been Harry Kim's domain. She nodded briskly. "Hailing frequency open, sir."

The face of a senior Narovian official hove into view; even to someone unfamiliar with her species' features and body language it was clear that the woman was under considerable stress. Her wide-set black eyes seemed curiously dull and flat, her hands incapable of holding still.

"This is Captain Tom Paris, USS Voyager. I believe you are expecting us, Doctor …?"

"Antal Faradh," she responded, the slight lisp that produced her last name showing a dark green tongue briefly emerging between her teeth. "Your presence is most welcome, Captain. Our need is great, and we are grateful."

"Thank you, Doctor Faradh. Starfleet Medical sends its greetings. We believe we have brought enough antigen for the entire population of Nemoth II, but cannot of course be sure. If you send us the coordinates for beam-down, we should be able to start almost immediately."

Curiously, the chief doctor did not seem as enthusiastic about this prospect as the occasion should, in Tom's view, have warranted. His interest was definitely piqued. Faradh's tongue came out again, wetting her lips, and she was casting nervous glances to someone or something off the screen.

Tom exchanged a questioning glance with his First Officer, then tapped the comm line again. He who delivers humanitarian assistance could make a few demands …

"Doctor, in order to ensure maximum efficiency of distribution, we'd be grateful if you could transmit the coordinates of all reception points and onward dissemination channels. We will be in the system for a few days, and our scientists would like to use the intervening time to carry out a distribution efficiency analysis. Our findings will enable us to be more effective in serving future pandemics."

"Yes, yes of course," she said. "Just give us a bit of time; as you can appreciate we are presently seriously understaffed. But we'll send you the information you require as soon as possible, as soon as we have freed someone up to collect it."

Tom suppressed a grim smile. Nacheyev had been right; there were problems here, and they were not even that well hidden. Even on a less-advanced non-Federation planet, the idea that local medical authorities would not have this kind of data at their fingertips at all times, let alone in the middle of a pandemic, was inconceivable. Something, or someone, was making the good doctor nervous, and was causing her to stall. He exchanged another glance with his First Officer.

"Well, I won't keep you from your important work, Doctor. We'll be in touch as soon as transport is complete, and look forward to receiving the data at your earliest convenience, together with confirmation whether the delivery has had the desired impact on your people. Paris out."

He cut the line unceremoniously; he had learned from Janeway that the worst thing you could do with people you wanted to impress with your authority was to allow them to have the last word. _And it sure doesn't hurt when the way you're talking sounds more like your father than yourself …_

With the screen now reflecting Narovian space again, Tervellyan turned to Baytart.

"Pablo, I take it you've plotted the most efficient course to the remaining planets in the system?" The pilot nodded. He had spent quite some time in the astrometrics lab with Icheb on the navigational problems created by the Snowflakes' intricate dance.

"Yes, sir. The nearest one is Parok IV, sir, three hour's flight at Warp 6. then Arren, an additional four hours at Warp 6. But Icheb's readings from astrometrics suggest that the interior systems will be even more affected by the gravitational disturbances than Nemoth II. In fact, the Snowflakes' current alignment is about as problematic for gravimetric distortions and EM disturbances as it could be, and we may not be able to maintain a stable warp field. Any travel through the cluster beyond Parok and Arren, we're looking at impulse all the way for the next two days. And at impulse we wouldn't even get halfway there in that time."

Tom sighed heavily and resisted rolling his eyes. _Of course - just my luck. _Great timing for the famous Dance of the Snowflakes to become an impenetrable blizzard… His First Officer's voice disrupted this rather unproductive line of thought.

"An alternative, Captain, is that once we've made our deliveries to Arren and Parok, we could go the long way. Through the edge of Federation space, rather than the Narov system itself. The new space station at Kalpak is just outside the system. We'll be able to travel there at warp and get close to at least the next two systems from outside the cluster, so we'll actually gaining rather than losing any time. Plus the plasma storms will have time to subside in the interim."

Baytart shuddered a little at the mention of plasma storms; the last time Voyager had tried to weather one of those, she had ended up rather a long way from home. But Tervellyan was not yet done. "In addition, if we want to pick up information, there's no better place to catch rumours than a space station. And sometimes those rumours are even true."

Tervellyan paused and looked at Tom, who grinned his appreciation in response. They both remembered their rather frantic conversations of about a year ago, when Jarod had been Admiral Nacheyev's newly-minted assistant while Tom had found himself forced to enter certain dens of iniquity on Nardik space station, in search of the missing heir of Andoria.

"We can spend a few hours reconnoitering, and still stay within the time frame we'd otherwise have. It's win-win, whichever way you turn."

"Good idea, Jarod. Spend the time we'd otherwise be doing nothing, or crawling along on impulse, learning something. I like it." It wasn't much, but a good deal better than hanging out in space waiting for the weather to improve.

Tom started rapping out orders. "Lieutenant Asil, please ensure the delivery coordinates are transmitted to Transporter Room One as soon as we've received them from Nemoth. Jarod, can you supervise the actual transport, and let me know when that's completed? Make sure the coordinates we're given are where they say they are. Pablo, plot in the course to Parok IV and Arren, and then to Kalpak Station at Warp 6.5."

…..

Their next two stops, accomplished within little more than a day given the proximity of the Narovian worlds to one another, were almost a carbon copy of the first. Welcoming noises from the authorities; dutiful, almost robotically expressed avowals of gratitude; reluctance to part with essential information. All underlaid by an apparent eagerness to ensure that Voyager's stopover would be a quick one.

There had been no overt signs anywhere of hostile seizure of the antigen, but neither had there been any indications from Nemoth of the pandemic abating, despite the fact that it had been their first stop. The comm silence from that planet had been deafening. To Tom's added frustration, a return to any of the planets where they had already made deliveries - to determine distribution patterns through nanoprobe tracing - would be impossible for nearly another three or four days, given the direction and size of the plasma storms currently coursing through the Snowflakes.

Tom shook his head as he rose from his chair. _Only eight weeks into your captaincy and already ready to smash your fist into a wall because things aren't moving fast enough? Get a grip, Paris. _ Might as well spend the downtime doing some research into the next stop – Kalpak Station. It was not yet subject to the Snowflakes' quarantine, and would hopefully provide some excitement as well as information.

The smile he felt forming on his face as he entered the ready room told Tom that he no longer felt like an intruder into someone else's – okay, Janeway's – personal sanctum. At some point over the last couple of weeks this space had become … his. It had not taken him long to appreciate it as the sanctuary that it was: A place to think, to plan, to prepare for what lay ahead. Not to mention to get away from judging eyes for a bit, and maybe, just maybe, to be Tom Paris for a moment … Perhaps he could even sneak a quick vid link to the nursery, to check, unseen, on Miral for a moment?

Tom sat down at his desk and called up the specs and background info for Kalpak Station. If they were going to look for intel there, he figured the more he knew about the place the better – its reputation in Starfleet, who owned it, where it sat with regard to the emerging politics of the sector, what kinds of people were likely to frequent it. Which bars to avoid. He wasn't planning on going onto the station himself, but you never knew; besides, he figured, his … rather rich experience in these matters could only help his team. If there was anything he _liked_ about being a Captain, it was that he could now issue warnings and advice with a simple command, rather than first having to spend hours convincing people of the merits of his often rather gut-driven views.

What emerged from his research were bits and pieces that fitted into a picture he had first heard of while he was studying at the Kirk Centre. With the drain on Federation resources that had come with the hard-fought Dominion War, the building of new space stations had increasingly been taken over by private investors.

Despite initial objections from some quarters, that space infrastructure should not be left to entities for whom profit was rather more important than, say, public welfare, the Federation Council had started to issue permits for the construction of several stations inside its space. Any station outside Federation space; like Kalpak, that wanted to have the benefit of Federation-registered traffic had to comply with similarly strict licensing rules.

Licensing was done under complex legal arrangements that made Tom's head spin, and he thanked The Powers That Be that he was a pilot, not a lawyer. But the upshot was something that even he could understand: as a concession to the fear mongers, no one individual or entity was permitted to have more than a 49% share in any given station. The resulting ownership conglomerates tended to reflect regional interests, species and power structures.

Given his own personal experience with corporate ethics and motivation, Tom spent considerable time looking at the registered ownership of Kalpak, hoping for something to jump out at him. After several attempts and rather complicated negotiations of data bases that he only managed to crack thanks to his newly elevated security clearance and a few hacking tricks he had sought out after the Enterprise's research had failed to unmask the corrupt owners of C&B, Tom's eyes arrested on the Holy Grail of commercial secrecy: A list of the station's Board of Governors.

Judging by the names on the list, the Board reflected a roughly equal mixture of Narovian, Rigellian and Orion backers. And there it was - Tom was sure of it. _Orions. _The only things of note to ever have emerged from that still rather backward world was its exotic and sensuous dancers, and a penchant for organized crime. Orion was reportedly beginning to emerge from a century or so of self-imposed isolation, though, and the station was located on a direct vector from the Federation, through the Snowflakes, and towards Orion's sphere of influence.

Supposing Kalpak was seen by the Orion government as a stepping stone in its quest to join the Alpha Quadrant mainstream? _Yeah, right. That and several ship loads of stolen antigen buys you all the influence and advancement you might want... _

But even after a diligent search, none of the names of the Orion backers of Kalpak set off any alarm bells in the system; the Syndicate had always been good at covering its tracks. Then again, you couldn't simply profile someone as a criminal kingpin just because of the species he belonged to. Tom chewed his lower lip in mild frustration and ploughed on. What exactly had he expected? Signed Syndicate membership cards?

By comparison, Rigellian participation was logical, given the relative proximity of Kalpak to both that system and its closeness to Federation space. Rigel had been a member of the Federation almost since its inception, and its people were known for their business acumen. The file disclosed a fairly hotly contested bidding war for the construction rights between Rigellian and Ferengi interests; again this was not surprising, given that rapprochement between the Snowflakes and the Federation was hardly a secret and anyone with any entrepreneurial sense at all could smell the latinum rolling in.

Steeling himself for a stultifying and bone-dry education on the politics of inter-stellar and inter-planetary trade and sectoral economics, Tom took off his jacket, rolled up his sleeves and plonked his elbows on the desk. So much for the ready room being a sanctuary … He cursed and hoped for something to happen that would relieve him of the tedium.

Tervellyan's voice, when it came after an hour or so, was a welcome reprieve, but for the news it conveyed.

"Captain, to the bridge, please. Long-range sensors have detected a derelict vessel, adrift in space. Eighteen bio-signs. None alive."


	4. Danse Macabre

**Chapter 4 – **_**Danse Macabre**_

The drifting vessel was unremarkable - a cargo ship of the now discontinued Rakota class, with Federation markings. It had seen at least thirty years of service judging by the small pockmarks left on its hull by inter-stellar dust, Oort cloud particles and the man-made debris found orbiting most industrialized planets. Its registration number traced back to a company called Universal Merchants Amalgamated, which a quick check identified as a company operating out of the Rigellian system, ambitiously named but without an actual place of business or verifiable ownership or activities. It had not been registered as lost, and there were no distress signals in place.

Based on preliminary scans, all four escape pods common to this class of ship appeared to have been launched. The number of pods should have been adequate to take the eight crewmembers for which a Rakota class vessel was licensed, and which were sufficient for its operations; the number of individuals remaining onboard therefore raised immediate questions.

Asil reported additional sensor findings in her usual flat and factual manner: Environmental systems were non-functional, with no sign of external factors that might have caused the catastrophic failure. Pending further examination, indications were that any breakdown that had resulted in the vessel being adrift appeared to have been purely mechanical - possibly a function of the vessel's age.

The bio signs of the deceased humanoids indicated their species as Orion. Asil opined that it would be logical to assume that disease had not been a factor in their deaths, nor in the abandonment of the ship by its crew, since no quarantine beacons had been set.

"Possibly," Tom said, "but given that the operators didn't seem to care that they had insufficient escape pod capability for everyone aboard, they may also not have cared so much what happens to anyone who claims salvage. I wouldn't assume that they were the type to bother setting beacons."

He took a deep breath. After seven years in the Delta Quadrant he was no stranger to death in space, but eighteen bodies, abandoned by the rest of their crewmates?

"Commander, please assemble an away team; take B'Elanna and another member of her team, plus security and a member of the medical staff. Priorities are to recover the ship's logs and determine the cause of both the systems failure and the death of these Orions, whoever they are. Finding out what they were doing on a Federation vessel would be a bonus, if you can do it. We'll consider what to do with the bodies when we know more, but I assume they'll at least temporarily need to be stored, so we should get stasis chambers ready. Cargo Bay Three should have space now that we've made some of our deliveries."

Tervellyan nodded his assent and left the bridge, issuing orders and calling up the members of the away team as he went. Tom's eyes followed him with a twinge of regret. Captains weren't supposed to go on away missions, he knew, but he fully intended to follow the example set by Kathryn Janeway in this regard.

Just not, perhaps, the very first time.

…..

B'Elanna wouldn't deny to herself the fact that she felt a certain mixture of excitement and apprehension at the prospect of an away mission. The apprehension part was relatively new, introduced into her conscious mind only since Miral had been born. It wasn't fear for herself as much as it was concern for what might happen to her daughter, should she not return. She reminded herself of the protocol that prohibited both parents of an on-board child to participate in missions at the same time; Tom would be there for their daughter should anything go wrong.

With that knowledge she was able to focus on the adrenaline coursing through her bloodstream, and on the memories of past missions where she had been tasked with boarding alien vessels with little idea of what she might find there: The Pralor vessel and its killer androids. Arturis' pseudo-prototype. The Malon freighter. Allowing herself to be assimilated by the Borg … Not particularly pleasant memories, any of them, but all successful missions in the end.

That all said, B'Elanna had always hated EVA suits – almost more than she hated zero grav conditions. She had a deep-rooted suspicion that the suits were either designed to be intrinsically incompatible with Klingon physiology, or to malfunction specifically whenever she personally put one on. At least this time, she would be within transporter range … She straightened her shoulders and shifted the weight of her portable diagnostic kit to the other hand before nodding to Tervellyan. Lieutenant Commander B'Elanna Torres was ready for action.

The Commander, in turn, confirmed the readiness of the rest of the team before issuing his orders to the crewman operating the transporter. Ensigns Schmidt from the security detail and Nabil from Engineering took their places together with Nurse Tval. The latter had replaced the EMH, Tervellyan's first choice, when B'Elanna had pointed out that in zero grav conditions, the hologram would essentially be at the mercy of his physically solid, and hence free-floating, mobile emitter. Tervellyan nodded at the transport operator.

"Five to beam over."

The small, cramped and dingy-looking bridge was empty, and dark. A request to the computer for lights failed to elicit a response of any kind. All systems were offline – the gravity field generator, electric, environmental, life support. B'Elanna suppressed the impulse to gag as the sudden absence of gravity played havoc with her sense of equilibrium. She swallowed hard and brushed aside a flew floating instruments, as she partly pushed, partly pulled her way to the engineering console in the corner of the bridge.

At Tervellyan's behest, Nabil headed for ops in order to try and establish the necessary link with Voyager for downloading the ship's logs from the emergency back-up, the so-called "black box" that was supposed to kick in when all systems failed. The Bajoran engineer entered the necessary commands and spat out a nasty-sounding Cardassian curse when his efforts resulted in nothing other than his being pushed away from the console.

"There's nothing here, sir," he said, his puzzlement evident even over the slight distortion of the EVA comm link. "Impossible to establish a link. The entire data storage system, including the black box, appears to have been deliberately erased before the surviving crew left the ship."

Tervellyan sounded perplexed. "Everything? Not even basic logical matrices we could use to reboot the system? Auxiliary operating systems we could boost up remotely from Voyager? A log telling what happened?"

"No sir, nothing. Complete blank. The computer's been wiped, including all back-up functions. Receptors. Logs. Crew and cargo manifests. You name it."

"That explains the absence of any residual distress beacon," B'Elanna observed. "But I wonder why someone would take the time to do this, when they're abandoning ship in what appears to have been a hurry, unless they had a protocol for a total wipe-out. We've got that for Starfleet assets, but I've never seen it on a commercial vessel. But Nabil's right, everything is blanked out, right down to the operating systems. The whole ship is dead. Someone left nothing to be found here."

"Probably because they don't want anyone to know what happened here, or what they were carrying as cargo," Schmidt suggested, a frost in his voice. He was managing to keep surprisingly still despite the zero grav conditions, doubtless the result of ten years of hard-wired self-discipline from his time in a Romulan prison camp.

"Not to mention the eighteen corpses we haven't found yet, and what may have happened to them." Schmidt, probably more than anyone else onboard Voyager apart from Tom Paris, knew a cover-up when he saw one.

Tervellyan stilled himself on a bulkhead and studied him thoughtfully through their respective faceplates. "You're right, Ensign," he said. "Their eagerness to erase the data has probably got to do with the dead passengers. Let's leave the engineering team to figure out what went wrong here and whether we can reconstruct the files, and you and I will go look for the bodies and find out what story they might tell us. Nurse?"

B'Elanna raised her hand to stop them, and hit her comm badge. "Torres to Voyager. Can you send the design specs for Rakota class ships to our tricorders?" She turned to the First Officer. "It'll make it easier to find your way around the ship, since the wall locators won't be functional."

She almost added, "I'm surprised you didn't think of that before," but she bit back the comment. Tom had impressed on her – privately - the need for a team approach on 'his' ship; second-guessing the XO on his first away mission didn't seem consistent with that. So far, Tervellyan had turned out okay, and she was prepared to cut him a degree of slack that she would not have even remotely considered giving in the Delta Quadrant. Maybe the year he had spent behind a desk had taken the edge off his mission planning skills?

The transfer of the data complete, they were able to trace the biosigns to a cargo hold on the lower deck and to map out the quickest route. In the absence of a functioning turbolift or transport, the Jeffries tubes would have to do, EVA suits or no – at least the zero grav would make the trek easier on everyone's knees.

The door they found resisted even the XO's considerable technical expertise, as well as Ensign Schmidt's inventive approach to both code-breaking techniques and accompanying colour commentary. Whoever had locked the thing, had done a comprehensive job; at least there were no booby traps. Tervellyan gave a heavy sigh of defeat, tapped his comm badge and called B'Elanna.

"Can you come down here, Commander? I'm afraid to admit it, but we're stumped. Someone went to great lengths to make sure that no one can get into this cargo hold, but it seems to be mechanical. Assume you have the tools to outwit them?"

Leaving Nabil on his own on the bridge made B'Elanna uncomfortable for reasons she could not quite lay her finger on. There was something about this ship … She shook her disquiet off only after he agreed to accompany her most of the way, so he could have a look at the engine room instead. Once there, she reassured herself that Voyager maintained its transport lock on him and headed for the lower deck, cursing her EVA suit every time it snagged on a strut or other feature of the Jeffries tube.

It did not take her long to find a way to crack the seals on the door. Applying a basic multi-phasic resonator in a few strategic locations, she first loosened the locking mechanism that secured the two sections of the door to one another, and then suctioned small power inverter devices to each of the door's two halves, cross-wiring them to blow them apart.

"Step back," B'Elanna ordered, and flipped the emergency switch on the wall. In the absence of air to carry the sound of the resulting explosion, the Voyager team felt rather than heard the shockwaves as a the two halves of the door disappeared into the wall recesses. Tervellyan was the first to step up to the opening, followed by Schmidt and then B'Elanna and Nurse Tval.

Nothing, but nothing in their preparations, in their various experiences, nor in the knowledge that their mission was to investigate multiple deaths, could have prepared the team for what they found in the cargo hold of the unnamed vessel.

Eighteen bodies, Orion females all, perfectly preserved in the vacuum that now pervaded the ship. Even in death, their beauty was staggering. Luminous green skin shimmered under the beams of the wrist lights the Voyager team shone over them. Luxuriant reddish or dark curls floating in space, the flash of an earring here and there, luscious curves barely covered by soft pale fabrics, all promising sensual delights both readily offered and expected.

'Orion slave girls,' so-called despite - or perhaps because of - the image of the forbidden conjured up by the name. Slavery was, of course, prohibited in Federation space, but the idea of playful, willing submission coupled with a hint of the dangerously exotic … now that was another matter entirely, and part of their allure.

Orion women remained the Alpha Quadrant's most coveted dancers, performers and companions in pleasure. Prized above dilithium for their ability to offer relaxation and entertainment in establishments frequented by the rich and the powerful, or to private clients who had made their names and their fortunes in matters of business, politics, exploration or conflict. Reviled once upon a time for the pheromones they would deploy to ensnare unwitting males or side-track suspicious females of other races, they were now permitted to practice their arts within the Federation subject to strict regulations, and to great acclaim.

But none of the glamour, none of the mystique was evident here, on this ship. Here, there was only death, no promises and no grace.

Several of the bodies must have been clustered right by the entrance, almost on top of one another. Now, as a result of the shockwave from the blast B'Elanna had applied to the door, they were moving away and apart in a grotesque dance, not unlike a flower opening in a slow motion vid. Tval gave a little gasp as she noticed the broken, bleeding nails on the fingers of several of the women, evidence of their desperation as they had clawed at a door that would not move.

A door that had been very thoroughly, and very deliberately, locked – from the outside.

Almost more distressing for the away team to see were those among the women who had been sitting – huddled in pairs or in small groups – with their backs to the wall, in tight embrace as life support failed. Resigned to their fate, awaiting it quietly, with what dignity they could salvage from understanding that no one would come for them. Now they, too, were floating in space in mute accusation.

"That lock. It wasn't meant to keep _us_ out," Schmidt's voice over the comm was a whisper, almost beyond even B'Elanna's keen hearing. "It was to keep _them_ in."

She swallowed, hard, as her mind recalled scenes she had seen while in the Maquis, scenes she wished she could forget, but never would. Memories that flowed through her Klingon blood like acid, making her want to lash out in a fury so hot, so sharp it would tear through the hull of this ship of death like a knife through butter.

She had never been as helpless as the women before her, but she had seen their like, again and again.

Had watched those not equipped to fight become the inconvenient flotsam left behind by forces beyond their control.

Had taken up their fight, when they could not do so themselves.

Without conscious thought on her part, B'Elanna's mind's eye saw Miral's face on each one of those floating bodies by the door, saw her little body floating, butterfly-light, in that bleak cargo bay. Had her daughter been onboard this ship, B'Elanna did not doubt that she would have been among them – too much trouble to deal with, not valuable enough to preserve. That old, proud sailor's mantra that Tom liked to cite, _women and children first_? In B'Elanna's own experience, honed in a conflict that knew no mercy, that principle was honoured far more often in the breach than it ever was in the observance.

B'Elanna itched for her phaser - for something, someone to shoot at to vent her rage. But she was Starfleet now, had been for a very long time, and after years of failed attempts had learned to contain her anguish in a balled, gloved fist. She hit the bulwark, repeatedly, longing to feel the pain that might stop her from screaming - and that might, somehow, show these dead women that someone cared.

A dangerous road, that, she knew better than most. Inflicting pain on herself would not be of help here. But she also knew beyond certainty that the atrocity before her demanded that an answer be made; her engineer's mind in turn did not take long to realize the most effective tool at her disposal. As the blood rage subsided into the fresh bruises in her hand, she activated the comm signal inside her helmet with a stab of her chin.

"Torres to Paris. Tom, you need to come over here. There is something you _must_ see."

Tervellyan's head flew up. Notwithstanding the horror before them, he could not help but be indignant at having been bypassed in this manner – summoning the Captain, if necessary at all, was his call to make. Not the Chief Engineer's. But for the reflection of the wrist lights on his face plate, the expression on his face would have clearly shown his question: _Is this what it means to have a husband-and-wife team in senior positions …_?

But it was too late. Tom responded instantly to the tone in B'Elanna's voice, surprised but fully aware, moreover, that she would not have commed him without good reason. He did not question her request.

"You're still onboard," they all heard him say softly, his only response.

That was one rule Tom Paris would never break, she knew: _One parent stays on the ship._ Miral would never be left behind, like these women had been.

"I'll beam back," she replied, without raising her eyes to the Commander, who glared at her but knew better than to assert his authority at that moment, with the Captain on the open line. "Nabil is working on the systems from the bridge, but it doesn't look like they could be rendered operational again anyway, based on what I saw. What's needed here isn't an extra engineer, but forensic investigation and salvage. And someone who can convince Starfleet to take action."

_Enough. _"There's really no need for you to come over here, Captain," Tervellyan stated coolly over the short-range comm link. "We can record the scene here through our visor cams and recover the bodies for dignified disposal, once the Orion authorities have been notified …"

"Understood, Jarod. But if B'Elanna thinks I should see this firsthand, I will. I'm on my way to the transporter room now and have them beam me straight to her last coordinates, _after_ she returns to the ship."

The last was a clear, if implicit, order to his First Officer as well as to his wife, who nodded crisply and gave the command to lock onto her comm badge without so much as a glance at the man in charge of the mission. Tervellyan ground his teeth in barely suppressed frustration, but said nothing. Instead he motioned T'val to start scanning the bodies, with the assistance of a stoic and silent Ensign Schmidt.

B'Elanna stepped off the pad and removed her faceplate as soon as the tingling of the transporter had finished. She remained silent and motionless as she watched Tom retrieve one of the EVA suits from the wall locker in the transporter room, quickly checking it for size before he scrambled into it. When he was done, he closed the distance between them with a few strides.

"How bad is it?" he asked, knowing.

"Bad," she replied. "Really bad. Tom, they … they were just left to die. In the cargo hold. Like … like …" she couldn't bring herself to finish the sentence, lest the blood rage boil up again.

Tom gripped her arms hard enough to leave finger marks, willing her to look him in the eyes. He knew her so well.

"Go get Miral," he said firmly. "_Now_. Take her back to our quarters. Hold her. Touch her. Feel her breathe. I will be back, and we will figure out how to respond."

And with that, he collected a small bag of transport badges, stepped onto the platform and nodded to the crewman in charge to send him to hell.

…..

"They all died of anoxia, sir."

Even though Tval summarized her findings in unusually flat tones, it did not escape Tom's notice that she delivered her report with her back to the cargo hold, refusing to look any longer at the macabre tableau of death that was even now burning itself into his retinas. He knew that in addition to the shock of what she was seeing, she would have to deal with the emotions of the crewmembers with her – his own included – and he questioned his decision to bring aboard an empathic nurse. Had the fact that he missed Kes, and been denied access to a counselor like Troi, clouded his judgment, made him pick the person most like them?

But to her credit, Tval pushed on, like the consummate professional that she was. "Depressurization must have occurred after the oxygen ran out, gradually, as the ship's other systems failed. There is minimal evidence of pressure-caused trauma to the cells or blood vessels."

"How long?" Tom asked. He did not need to elaborate.

"The tolerance of a low oxygen environment differs between humans or Vulcans, and Orions, sir. Even without knowing the precise rate of oxygen depletion, they would have become disoriented after two or three minutes, and lost consciousness after five or six. Irreversible brain damage, then death would have occurred three or four minutes after that."

Tom took a deep breath of his own at this recitation of the inevitable, remembering what it had felt like that day, when he and B'Elanna had stared a similar death in the face. Their dizziness had not been permitted to turn into permanent sleep, though. Someone had come for them …

But Tval was not done. "A few of the women show evidence of recent sexual activity, within the last forty-eight to seventy-two hours. It is safe to assume that the crewmembers who departed in the escape pods were male. We should be able to obtain and record the DNA of the … donors once we are back on Voyager, sir."

Tom nodded his thanks to the nurse, and patted Schmidt - who had been floating near-motionless beside him - on the arm to get his attention. "Make sure you get the EMH to obtain those DNA samples as soon as we get the bodies back to Voyager, and have him send it to Starfleet. It's evidence. It may not be able to help us figure out who locked that door, but it should be able to help them identify who was onboard."

He turned to his XO, grateful to have an excuse to avert his gaze from the room. Behind the plate, his features had settled into that cold, taut mask he thought he had shed for good; he could almost feel it descend on his face now like a physical thing, and found himself irrationally grateful for its constraining presence.

His next words were for the Commander's ears only, and so he motioned him to touch faceplates. "Jarod, don't blame B'Elanna for going around you like that. I'll speak with her about it, in due course, but for now rest assured that she was right. I _did_ need to see this. Don't ask me to explain, please, just trust me on this."

He disengaged, and tapped his comm badge. "Paris to Nabil. Are you finding anything up there that might lead you to believe there was sabotage in play, or that the systems can be restored?"

Two very different questions, but Nabil was a capable engineer despite his relatively junior status, and ready to answer both. The only member of the away team who had not been near the cargo hold, he managed to respond with a tone that was almost jarringly energetic by comparison to the muted sounds that prevailed on the lower deck.

"That's a no on both counts, sir. There appears to have been a cascade failure caused by a complete breakdown first of the matter-anti-matter converters in the engine, and then by some moron's attempt to compensate by diverting energy from all other systems, including life support. The initial burst of energy that produced overloaded the plasma manifolds, which in turn set off a chain reaction in the EPS circuitry and blacked out life support. By the time they realized what was happening, the computer would have been offline and they couldn't bring any of the systems back up. The failure probably triggered the wipe-out protocol. Everything went downhill from there. Looks like the grav stabilizers were the last thing to go, likely not until after the escape pods were released."

Tom stood still for a moment, gathering his thoughts. It was easier to do than it should have been – was he getting accustomed to atrocity? Or was he adjusting to the requirements of command, the need to be the one who kept things together? He hoped it was the latter. How often had he seen Janeway march seemingly unaffected through scenes that had most others lose their composure, if not their stomach contents?

"Acknowledged. I think there is not much left for you to do here, so you and T'val can go back. The Commander and I will stay and oversee transport of the bodies into …" Try as he would, he could not bring himself to say _cargo hold_. "… the stasis chambers we asked the Doc to prepare. Arno, get some more of your people over here and have a look at the living quarters, see if you can find any information at all about the identity of these women, or the people who ran this ship. They may have wiped the data, but can't have taken _everything _personal with them."

Tom turned to Tervellyan. Everyone but the command team had left the room, where some of the bodies continued in slow-motion movement, caused by the Voyager crew's various activities. In a gravity-free environment devoid of atmospheric friction, the bone-chilling dance would continue for a long time unless stopped by outside forces …

"Let's tag them for transport," he said, holding the bag of transport badges out to this XO. "And bring them to a place where they will count for something."

Tervellyan's puzzlement came through despite the fact that his faceplate reflected Tom's wrist light, and his features could not be seen. "Isn't tagging the bodies something Schmidt and the security detail should be doing?" he asked.

Tom frowned briefly at the question, his answer a chill breath against his faceplate. "On my ship, there is nothing I would ask one of my crew to do that would not be prepared to do myself. And there are certain things I will not ask my crew to do. And I will _never_ delegate something as essential as respect."

…**..**

Two mentally exhausting, debilitating hours later, Tom found himself in his ready room, cursing the Starfleet bureaucrats who had refused to permit him the engagement of a counselor on the grounds that Voyager's mission was intended to be of 'less than six week's duration'. Where had he heard _that_ before…? The logic for not authorizing the deployment of counselors to short-term missions was, apparently, that they were an expensive resource, and six weeks was an acceptable delay in mandatory post-traumatic stress counseling. Tom had personally never been a fan of what he used to refer somewhat derogatorily as the "routine psych detox", but he would not deny its utility for others.

Nurse Tval, for one, whose control seemed paper-thin after what she had seen and felt on the freighter. Ensign Schmidt, only recently come off a lengthy course of PTSD treatment, could probably use a refresher. Remote sessions would have to do for those who felt they needed them, for now – at least they weren't in the Delta Quadrant, and subspace communications were fully functional. He made a note to pass the recommendation on at the briefing.

Tom had to admit to himself that he certainly wouldn't have minded a … chat with Deanna Troi; he suspected neither would B'Elanna. But they would have to find their responses in other ways. For now. He rubbed his face with both hands before getting up and heading for the briefing room. Time for the preliminary wrap-up and analysis of the away team's findings.

B'Elanna and Tervellyan summarized what Tom already knew, for the benefit of the senior officers who had not been present. Asil's Vulcan features remained unreadable, while Baytart was swallowing convulsively, trying to appear unaffected by what he heard even as he was evidently relieved that he had been spared the seeing. The EMH looked grimmer than usual.

Asil advised that the ops team had deployed warning beacons around the derelict ship, declaring it to be a crime scene and subject to Federation authority - based on the inter-planetary laws of salvage. Anyone who boarded or otherwise interfered with her would be subject to criminal sanctions (if caught). Additionally, she had attempted to trace the energy signatures of the departing escape pods, but had only been able to do so for a few hundred thousand kilometers. At that point they had disappeared – effectively erased by the gravitational and EM disturbances caused by the annual Dance of the Snowflakes.

The Doc had confirmed Nurse Tval's initial findings, with the addition of an estimated time of death of the Orion women, calculated on the rate of desiccation of cells and soft tissue due to exposure to vacuum. According to his calculations the ship had been without atmosphere for just a little over eighteen standard hours – meaning the escape pods with the surviving crew were likely still in the vicinity. Asil's eyebrow shot up as she punched a PADD calculating new and additional sensor sweeps that she would have her team conducting shortly.

None of the women showed any trace of the Magellanic virus. In fact it appeared they had all been inoculated, by an antigen that was not inconsistent with the one cultured by Starfleet. Tom cast a questioning look at the Doc, who shook his hand almost imperceptibly and responded matter-of-factly.

"The antigen appears to have been in their bodies for some time so it was not from our own delivery into the system. It could, however, have come from the ships Starfleet previously sent."

In addition, the EMH was able to confirm that the DNA samples taken from the victims showed two donors of Orion origin, four Rigellian and one human; all male, of course. It was an unusual combination for a Federation-registered vessel, but the presence of male Orions could be explained, to some extent, by the ship's female passengers. Available information on the ownership of the company that operated the vessel showed it to be limited to Rigellians.

Finally, Mike Ayala reported, in a few sparse words. After the Command and engineering teams had left the ship, a security detail led by himself and Arno Schmidt had gone over the remainder of the vessel. The Captain's quarters had been hastily emptied of anything that would have stored information concerning its owner's identity or the vessel's activities, course or ownership. Everything moveable had been tossed into the recycler; remnants of one possibly salvageable PADD had been given to Ops to determine whether the contents could be reconstructed.

The crew quarters had been similarly bare, although there the absence of usable intelligence was not so much a matter of deliberate destruction, as it appeared to have been the result of the transient life style of their occupants. Whoever manned this ship had simply not bothered to bring parts of themselves onboard, or else had been advised not to do so. But the salient fact was this: Voyager's security team had found only eight bunks, spread over five cabins - two singles, and three doubles.

The dead women, it appeared, had slept in the cargo hold where they had been found: the floor was covered with thick, mattress-like foam, and apart from the blankets some of them had been wrapped in, wall storage units held additional material that could be regarded as bedding.

Tom looked around the table, to see if anyone else had anything to contribute. Mutely shaking heads met his gaze.

"Right," he said. "There isn't much more we can do for now. Jarod, could you bundle Mike's and the medical team's findings up and transmit everything to Starfleet? They're in as good, if not better, a position as we are to trace the owners and operators of that ship, and the people whose DNA we collected. Ask them to send back anything they find. I also want Starfleet's instructions on what to do about the bodies, in case the Orions do or don't want the Federation to keep them. I assume there'll be some diplomatic procedure or other we'll need to follow either way. Pending a response, we'll keep them in stasis in Cargo Bay Three. They're better off here than on … that ship."

Nods around the table told him that his instincts were shared; on Voyager at least, the women would be treated in death with the consideration and respect they had evidently not been given while alive.

Tom compressed his lips grimly, before continuing. "In the meantime, we still have our primary mission to complete. There are hundreds of thousands of sick and possibly dying people out there waiting for the assistance we came here to provide. So let's get on with it. Next stop Kalpak station."

The other officers filed out of the briefing room in silence, B'Elanna giving him a long look as she left him behind – a promise that they would talk later, in the privacy of their quarters.

…..

Back in his ready room, Tom stood by the observation window for a few silent minutes, staring at the small cluster of stars, stationary for the moment, until Baytart engaged the engines again. It was remarkable, really, that neither the disaster they had just witnessed nor the intricate gravitational forces that regularly wreaked such havoc on the worlds that circled them, were reflected in the serene beauty of those far-off points of light.

Not so far off in the distance one of those suns, he knew, was Bellatrix. Also called "the Amazon star", it had been known on Earth for millennia now as the left shoulder of Orion, one of the most recognizable constellations in the Terran sky, seen in both hemispheres as the seasons turned. The great hunter of Greek mythology whom the ancients had thought they saw in the sky was himself the subject of different legends, none considered definitive, all tragic. Had he been killed by a scorpion's poison, or by the bow of the goddess Artemis? Had Ulysses seen his shadow in the underworld, or had he been elevated to the heavens by his remorseful divine lover?

Out here, Bellatrix was one star among many; the constellation had no meaningful visual shape in this part of the galaxy. It was, in fact, above remarkable that the people who called Bellatrix their sun - albeit not by that designation - and whose connection to Earth was intermittent at best and often contentious, had nonetheless accepted for their world to be called by the hunter's name: _Orion III._ A name surrounded by shadows and secrets, whispering of desire, of ambition - of silent death without mercy.

How very fitting, he thought, not for the first time.

Tom ran his right hand through his hair as he tried – and failed, for once - to find meaning in the silent song of the stars. He stopped at his neck to knead the hardened muscles there, but stilled his hands self-consciously when it occurred to him that maybe Captains shouldn't admit to fatigue. Had Janeway ever done so? Oh hell. He knew he was no Janeway, and no need pretending.

He put his hand on the desk and balled his fingers into a fist, which he slammed down hard before picking up a PADD marked urgent. It contained a report from Nicoletti in engineering, detailing the drain on the ship's energy reserves that would result from keeping eighteen stasis fields operational. He cursed softly. Well, they could replenish supplies at Kalpak station and if all else failed, it wouldn't be the first time Voyager's crew had been subject to rationing. He made a note and transmitted the report back to engineering with his orders. The stasis fields _would_ be maintained.

Later that night, in the calm that was his and B'Elanna's quarters and their family's home, Tom took his own advice. Miral did not usually sleep in her parents' bed but this night, he and B'Elanna had agreed, would be an exception. He tiptoed into her bedroom and gently lifted her out of the crib, holding her tightly against his chest for a moment before carrying her through the living area and into his and B'Elanna's room. He gently lowered her into the middle of the bed, pulled the blanket over her sleeping form and crawled in beside her.

There were few things, Tom had decided early on into the adventure of fatherhood, that could not be at least temporarily relieved by feeling your child's heart beat against your own, or by touching her soft hair with your lips. And if your hand could reach across to feel your mate's warm shoulder at the same time and feel her fingers lace through your own, that was even better.

Life. Love. Hope. They existed. If not in all places, then at least here, and now. If you knew where to find them.


	5. Paso Doble

**Chapter 5 – Paso Doble**

_Kalpak Station, Deep Space_

The bar on Kalpak Station was one of those facilities found in most space stations or spaceports, usually saddled with names ranging from the unimaginative to the preposterous. The Snowflake Lounge was a clear example of the former. In a place like this, the quality of the drinks, the clientele and entertainment on offer - and the likelihood of getting phasered in the back, or not – tended to be a direct function of the nature of the trade routes the station served, or of its proximity to the nearest conflict zone.

Mike Ayala had seen a wide variety of space station joints during his years in the colonies, the DMZ and the Delta Quadrant; this one seemed positively classy by comparison. There was an actual bar with overhead racks of glasses and stools; the tables that were scattered around the central stage looked almost clean; and the patrons looked reasonably well-heeled. They had to be, given the steep entrance fee and cover charges. Tervellyan concurred that charging people just to get in was a new approach for him, too – the result of privatization of space assets? Owners looking for profits wherever they could find them …? But they had their orders, and so had paid up without much hesitation.

Half a dozen cheap mechanical waiters buzzed through the crowd on hover pads, balancing multi-coloured drinks that jingled and sloshed precariously each time a heedless customer made a sudden move or stumbled drunkenly in their path. The logistics of moving through the room were impeded somewhat by a small, raised stage at the back wall around which the majority of tables - and patrons - were clustered.

Kalpak may have been beyond the edge of Federation space, but given the recent appetite in the Narov system for expansion of both its trade and political connections, the station seemed to be picking up a lot of through-traffic, both of the commercial and diplomatic variety. Entrepreneurs from all walks of life, intent on opening up a new area for investment and ensuring that they would get their share of the opportunities, were here mingling with the crews of commercial freighters.

A pack – a greed? - of Ferengi were jabbering away near the bar, while a small group of Andorians, whose members were visibly deferential to one particular male dressed in sumptuous robes, was holding court in a corner. From the snatches of conversation Ayala picked up as he wove through the crowd, pausing occasionally to listen, the virus pandemic in the Narov system was a topic of considerable interest. Many of those in the bar, including the Andorians, groused about having been unable to conduct their business thanks to the strict quarantine rules.

Still, the noise level was relatively low, as patrons awaited the advertised entertainment: "_The Sensuous Saleena and Her Sisters! __They will have you writhing in pleasure with each dance…!_" The name featured in numerous conversations, usually accompanied by explicit suggestions of what the speaker would like to do with the entertainer or her 'sisters', singly or jointly, if the opportunity arose. Ayala readily surmised that herein lay the origin of the exorbitant charges: people who came to the Snowflake Lounge didn't just come to drink. They came to be entertained, and extravagantly so.

Occasionally, shouts erupted from a couple of apparently equally popular Dabo tables, located in a well-lit room off the back that was open to the main bar. Ayala went over to have a look, and thanks to a reflective glare in the corner was able to take notice of a number of discreet holocams that were trained on the tables as well as the entrance way. The fleeting thought came to Ayala that if his Captain were here, he'd likely make a face for the viewers' benefit. Similar cams seemed to be stationed at strategic corners around the bar; now that he was aware of them, they were evident everywhere.

Judging by the amount of latinum that seemed to be crossing the table each time the wheel was spun, supervision was well advised. The security officer silently nodded his approval, even though it was not clear to him who was supposed to be kept in line – the customers or the employees. Probably both. Even in the dim light it was obvious that both the Dabo girls were Orion though, and there his approval ended.

"Watch the wheel, not the girl," was a well-known adage among those inclined to gambling, but with Orion females at the table and emitting their particular brand of distracting … scents, not to mention their provocative body language, that would be a damn hard thing for most males (and for many of the female customers). Had one or more of the dead women on that freighter been destined for this place, to make an easy, if questionable living on a busy and growing space station where money flowed freely?

Ayala's internal antennae went up, and he was beginning to see why the Captain had asked him to accompany the First Officer on what the latter had described as a "basic recce". There was an undercurrent here, something he could not quite put his finger on. Quark's bar on Deep Space Nine this was most definitely not: He looked around carefully to see if he could find someone who looked like he or she might be the proprietor, and failed. Whoever ran this place stayed in the background.

Tervellyan clapped him on the shoulder. "Might as well get a drink, Lieutenant. The boss wants us to scope the place – what better way than blending in, with a glass of Romulan ale in hand? Come, let me get you one."

Ayala almost frowned. He never drank real alcohol on duty, and as far as he was concerned, this was duty – bar or not. "Synthale please, sir," he said.

Tervellyan shrugged. "Suit yourself. I tell you, after what we found on that ship, I'm ready for a _real_ drink. Why don't you find us a table by the stage? May as well see something while we're here."

He headed for the bar, leaving the Lieutenant a little baffled at the cavalier attitude the First Officer seemed to be bringing to their task. Then again, he recalled that his Captain tended to approach things in the same off-handed manner, only to display a coiled-steel intensity when the moment called for it. Paris and Tervellyan had attended the same command training course; maybe that was the style they taught there?

Taking full advantage of his height, Ayala allowed his eyes to scan over the available seating. Choices appeared to be limited, especially around the stage. _Must be a popular act, those Saleena siblings. _Finally,he spotted a Tarkellian inserting a credit chip into one of the waiters' card slots. His face indicated that he was doing so on someone's orders, rather than on his own accord. Ayala headed for the man's table without hesitation, looking over at the bar to see if he could get the XO's attention.

Tervellyan, who held two drinks in his hand, seemed to be in intense conversation with a patron who was seated on one of the stools. He looked up and caught Ayala's eyes on him. Smiling, he waved his drink and set it down beside the other man before heading over to where Ayala had taken his seat, a second glass in hand.

"Here's your drink, Lieutenant. Listen, I met someone I know from my Academy days; he's a civilian now, duranium trader. Been here a few times, he says, and I think it might be a good opportunity to chat him up and see what he knows about the comings and goings in this place. Better done one-on-one though; some people don't easily open up to strangers. You don't mind if I leave you alone for a few minutes? I think it'll be worthwhile."

He put the glass of synthale down in front of Ayala, who frowned a little. The Captain's instructions had been for the two of them to stay together, but he supposed that being ten or so meters away and in visual range at the bar still qualified as "together".

"I'll be back in a few minutes. In the meantime, feel free to sit or wander around. See what you can pick up." Tervellyan clapped Ayala on the shoulder and headed back to the bar, where it did not take long before he was engrossed in his conversation again.

Taking a sip of his synthale, Ayala contemplated his next move. He considered himself to be a fair tactical officer with pretty good reactions in a fight, but he had never been a man of many words. Making small talk with strangers, trying to draw them out to gather intel, wasn't really up his alley. Why had the Captain insisted he come along again? Ah yes, Delta Quadrant instinct for sniffing out bad vibes. Well, if Tom Paris - the same guy who had gone through all kinds of personal hells on behalf of the Maquis – had asked him to collect information, who was Miguel Ayala to say no to opening a conversation? Mike sighed inwardly, swallowing his aversions in the process. Small talk it would have to be. He scanned his immediate vicinity for a likely target.

The Iridian at the table next to his seemed temporarily alone, his companion having headed for the facilities after one too many Circadian Moonbeams. Ayala willed the man to look over for a couple of minutes, trying to catch his eyes. When that failed, he reached over and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Hey. That Saleena any good? Sure is pricey."

The man turned around, and swayed a little as he tried to focus on the big Lieutenant. Clearly the bright red drink in front of him was neither synthetic, nor his first. His eyes narrowed as he took in the Starfleet uniform and two pips. Ayala noticed, and sat back a little, the faster to have access to his phaser, if required. But the Iridian's response was polite enough, and Ayala relaxed again.

"Oh man, you've no idea. Hot enough to melt the roof struts, when she gets going." He mimicked the shaking of singed fingertips, blowing on them before taking another sip of his drink. "Gets a real a rise out of the customers, if you know what I mean. Lucky ones get to take one of them to Deck Three with them for a bit. Not me, though. Can't afford it."

Having evidently decided a spot of conversation was preferable to sitting alone, he posed a question of his own, even if it wasn't exactly friendly banter. "So what's Starfleet doing in these here parts? Federation run out of worlds to conquer?"

Despite the lilting sing-song of his accent, the Iridian's voice carried an ill-disguised mistrust, and a challenge. Something to build on; people with a chip on their shoulder usually didn't hesitate to share it.

"The pandemic," Ayala offered. "Bringing some medicine into the sector. Should help, but people seem to be suspicious of our motives. Can't see why. Not like we're trying to poison people or anything."

The Iridian snorted contemptuously into his drink – an impressive sound, given the extra-wide nostrils his race was endowed with. "Yeah, right. Help. _Sure._ Selling your drugs to the highest bidder, more like. That'll make you a lot of friends here, I bet."

Ayala was intrigued. "Strictly humanitarian freebies. What makes you think we're selling?"

The man gave another snort, his disposition souring with the speed common to those whose mood had been chemically enhanced to begin with. "The commissary on Deck Five is administering shots to anyone headed into the Snowflakes. Half a bar of latinum a pop. Starfleet containers are still sitting in the corner, lest there be any doubt where the stuff comes from."

He rolled up his sleeve and showed off a small, reddish bump near his wrist. "You're lookin' at a week's wages, buster. Stings like a Tyronian blackflea bite, too. So don't sing me no songs of altruism, _Starfleet_. Screw you."

He turned his back on Ayala again and grabbed his drink with his un-inoculated hand, as if to make a point. His companion was weaving through the crowd to rejoin him, and the conversation was clearly at an end.

Ayala shrugged off the man's hostility – and his slight amusement at being called _Starfleet,_ as if it were the insult he himself had once thought it was - and took a sip of his drink. Should he wait for the Commander to return before passing on this interesting tidbit of information? He looked across to the bar, where Tervellyan seemed deeply absorbed in discussion with his old acquaintance, human with a bit of something else in him, from what Ayala could see across the room. He couldn't see the Commander's face, but judging by the set of his shoulders, the conversation was an intense one.

Seeing no signs that his XO was about to disengage himself, Ayala hit his comm badge. The noise in the bar was such that it would drown out his own voice to anyone listening, not that anyone was paying him any attention.

"Ayala to Voyager."

Tom's voice came on. "Paris here. Go ahead, Mike."

"Captain, I just heard a claim that some of the medication we've been delivering has found its way here, and is being sold by the station commissary. I haven't been able to verify the claim yet."

"Is it worth going to have a look?"

"I think so, but I'd have to leave the Commander, sir. He's in a discussion with someone he knows, someone he thinks he can get some intel from." Ayala cast another glance at the bar, where Trevellyan was leaning into his conversation partner, listening intently to what he was saying. "Doesn't look like he'll be finished anytime soon."

There was a momentary pause, and silence in the comm link. Ayala could practically see Tom Paris chewing his lip as he always did when thinking hard.

"You think it's safe to split up?"

"Place doesn't seem so bad, Captain. Someone runs a pretty tight ship here. Surveillance cameras everywhere."

"Fine then, Mike, go ahead. Keep in touch as needed. Paris out."

….

Back on Voyager, Tom released his lip from his teeth and, with a note of determination in his voice that reminded him oddly of his father, commed Sickbay.

"Paris to the Doctor. Doc, can you transmit the nanoprobe signature to Ops? We're ready for our first proper scan, I think."

He didn't wait for the reply, instead turning to Asil. "Lieutenant, you'll be getting some data from Sickbay in the next few seconds. Please enter it into main sensors, then do a max resolution sweep of the station. Route to the main viewer."

Asil raised an eyebrow at the request; whatever data link the Captain was requesting from Sickbay had not been briefed to the senior staff. But orders were orders, and no doubt he had his reasons. What appeared on her console was a coded sequence of something she recognized immediately as being of Borg origin.

_Nanoprobes_, the Captain had said to the EMH; her father had told her about them, and the various medical uses the Voyager crew had put them to in the Delta Quadrant. Her Vulcan mind raced through what she knew, and came to the logical conclusion even as the outline of Kalpak Station appeared on the screen at her command.

"May I assume then, Captain, that the Doctor marked the antigen with nanoprobes?"

"Yes, he did," Tom replied softly as the screen lit up with dozens of moving single pinpoints of light, as well as a couple of larger glowing blurs that he figured must be central distribution or storage sites. A small smile ghosted across his face.

"And it worked, too. Look at the bundled signals in the centre of the station – that must be Ayala's commissary."

He checked that the comm link to Sickbay was still open. "Doc – you may want to come up here and see the results of your and T'val's handiwork. It's quite impressive. Permission to gloat."

Baytart pointed to the largest glowing area, off to the right on the screen. "What's that? It doesn't seem to be attached to the main station. A docked ship, perhaps?"

"Overlay display with the structural schematic of the station," Tom ordered, with barely a glance over his shoulders. A few taps from Ensign Roberts, who had been left in charge of Tactical during Ayala's absence, and a fine grid showing individual decks and docking areas superimposed itself over the dark outline produced by Asil's earlier image. Tom noted with fleeting satisfaction that his guess regarding the commissary had been correct.

"It is indeed a spaceship, sir," Asil confirmed matter-of-factly. "Docked in Bay 16 Alpha. A commercial freighter, Whorfin class. Federation signature, Rigellian in origin."

"Switch scan to reflect biosigns, Lieutenant, and magnify."

Asil entered a few commands into her console as the screen zoomed in on the ship. "Seven bio signs. The ship is licensed for a crew of ten; not all may be onboard. Of those who are, there are two Rigellians, three Orions, and two Narovians. "

Tom nodded in acknowledgement of the caution, and then whistled tonelessly at the list. "That's quite the alliance," he said grimly, to himself as much as to anyone listening. "Starfleet seems to have under-estimated just how far inter-planetary diplomacy has advanced within the private sector."

The turbolift swished open, and the EMH entered. A smug smile spread across his features as he watched the display on the screen. "Ah," he said, his comments directed at no one in particular. "My guess is that this would be our first shipment, from Nemoth."

Tom looked up from his scrutiny of the ship's specs. "Well yes, that makes sense. We've had two additional drop-offs since , so there would have been enough time for that shipment to get here before us. Too bad we can't tell the difference to confirm, though."

The EMH looked, if anything, even more satisfied with himself. "As a matter of fact, we can, Mr. … _Captain, _provided we can obtain an actual sample."

Tom cocked an eyebrow. "Actually, we're well on our way to doing just that. Care to enlighten us what that will tell us?"

The Doc preened a little. "I considered that it might be helpful to refine the tracking system you suggested by enabling us to distinguish between shipments. Yet another page we took from those aliens that had … you and Commander Torres so _excited_, back in the Delta Quadrant. You will recall they left something like bar codes on the DNA strands they altered."

Tom glared at him briefly, but curiosity and the need for strategically useful information won out over the temptation to put the Doctor in his place. "So what'd you do, carve little numbers into a few of the nanoprobes? One, two, three? Or something more … sophisticated?" He raised a challenging eyebrow.

The Doctor had the grace to look a little flustered. "Well, as a matter of fact … Yes, that's exactly what we did. We thought things were best kept simple."

Tom was already moving on, weighing his tactical options based on what he had just heard. With the confirmation from the sensors, there was no need for Tervellyan and Ayala to remain on the station; Mike, moreover, would have acquired his sample by now.

He tapped his comm badge.

…..

It had not taken Ayala long to locate the Commissary, where a couple of Narovians and a Rigellian were busily exchanging hyposprays for eighths of latinum, from behind an apparently well-secured counter; the outlets for force fields were patently visible to his trained eye.

The place was swarming with customers. Ayala counted representatives from at least eight or nine different species, almost evenly divided between those coming from member planets of the Federation and those from outside. Among the latter, he noted several Narovians and Iridians, a couple of Rigellians, a handful of Ferengi and one solitary Orion whose job it seemed to be to open boxes and check off the inventory.

The price the vendors asked for the hyposprays with the antigen was considerable, but the Captain – apparently based on experiences gained during that mission on Andoria – had insisted that the away team went to the station well supplied with funds. He had, over Tervellyan's vague protests, even appointed Chell as the unofficial Ship's Purser, a position that was non-existent elsewhere in Starfleet; the XO had not been comforted by the fact that the appointment was apparently based on the Bolian's long-standing experience as "Jenny Delaney's second in the betting pool". The Captain's only nod to propriety had been a stern reminder that they'd have to file expense claims if and – but only if – they actually spent their funds. If they were returned untouched, the transaction never happened and there was no need for paperwork. Tom Paris was many things, Ayala had learned over the years, but a bureaucrat was definitely not among them.

Less than two minutes after his arrival, and thanks in no small part to his intimidating height and grim face, Ayala had navigated the unruly crowd in the commissary and held a hypospray in his hand. Having been inoculated against the Magellanic blood virus prior to Voyager's departure from McKinley, he gruffly waved off the offer to have it administered on the spot, citing lack of proper hygiene standards in the facility.

The complaint gave him an excuse to scrutinize the place with an expression of contempt he did not have to fake. The commissary appeared to be one of a franchise that had been spreading slowly into stations across the Quadrant, to sell wares that could not easily – or not legally – be replicated. All the chain's shops were characterized by their trademark non-descript grey walls and a penchant for selling holovids of scantily-clad individuals, mostly women, of varying races. The extensive wall where the vids were kept seemed to undulate, thanks to the moving images on the covers. These in turn had been designed to appeal to low-brow appetites from across the entire spectrum of humanoid … tastes, and equipped with special codes that made it impossible to replicate them.

Ayala wasted no time looking at the store's wares, focusing instead on the individuals who were serving the crowding, jostling customers. He noticed that the hypospray business seemed somewhat divorced from the regular sales section. A lone Narovian woman sold the access codes for the two public replicators, as well as supposedly "original" local trinkets and a fairly extensive collection of firearms. She seemed oddly deferential towards the three men who were running the obviously far more profitable antigen sales. The big Lieutenant wondered briefly what might be available for sale in the back rooms, but he had gotten what he had come for and decided to leave before his scrutiny of the place could attract undue attention.

When Ayala returned to the bar, flashing his low-tech entrance stamp to the big Nausicaan doorkeeper, he found the atmosphere to have changed dramatically. The lights had dimmed, and coloured lights that lashed and stabbed across the ceiling were reminiscent of the inside of an active inversion nebula – jarring, jolting, electrifying.

By contrast, the air in the room seemed to have gotten heavier. The scent that now seemed to permeate the room reminded Ayala vaguely of something – what was it? Oh yes, the fumes emanating from the sweetgrass smoked during certain spiritual ceremonies on Dorvan IV, and of which Chakotay had still had a reasonable supply during their early days in the Maquis. Ayala shook his head to clear it and willed his body into taking only shallow gulps of air through his mouth. But he also noticed that no matter the impact of the fumes on his mental acuity, he was clearly far less affected by them than others in the bar. The Iridian he had spoken with earlier gave an audible moan, and his eyes were starting to roll back in his head in approaching ecstasy.

Music that had previously only punctuated the background as so much white noise now assaulted the eardrums without mercy, and could be felt strumming through the metal plates in the floor. The blend of ethereal, pipe-like sounds and an unfamiliar-but-gripping percussive rhythm was hypnotic; patrons were swaying in time to whatever moved them.

It was obvious to Ayala that there was something very calculated in the overall concoction of sensory experiences being unleashed inside this bar, something intended to prime the patrons for whatever would follow. The cocktail of scents in the air in particular caused him to catch his breath and set his body to tingling with an anticipation - of what? – that was almost akin to full-out physical arousal. In some of the customers, it clearly was having precisely that effect.

After a few minutes of the sensual barrage, and thanks to a clever streaming of the lights, all eyes were being inexorably directed at the door to the small stage at the back wall, including those of the Commander. Tervellyan was still standing beside his acquaintance at the bar, apparently no more – but also no less – affected than Ayala himself, and had turned to the stage as if pulled by invisible strings.

The entrance started to pulse with a different light, flashing across the green-blue-purple spectrum and back, faster and faster. Suddenly they blurred into a bright whiteness that was almost painful in its intensity. Ayala shut his eyes briefly against the glare, but the pulsating light was inescapable, even through closed lids.

He reopened his eyes in time to see three green-and-white blurs spill from the opening and onto the stage to the approving roar of the crowd, many of whom were obviously familiar with what was about to happen, and had been anticipating it with raucous shouts. The small knot of Andorians in the corner had stopped talking; their principal sat back in his chair, any attempt at maintaining his dignity betrayed by his antennae, which were rippling and swaying in movements that were clearly beyond his control, their quivering tips pointing towards the stage.

The three Orion women took up their places on the stage with a fluid grace that nearly robbed Ayala of his breath. He had heard of their performances, of course – they were known across the galaxy as the supreme embodiment of sensual and carnal delights – but had never seen one of them. His first experience with Orions had been … that ship; the contrast between what he had seen there and what was before him now could not have been greater.

Beautiful to behold the so-called 'slave girls' had been in death, but alive they exuded an almost animal magnetism. Hot desire, made radiant mantis-green flesh; moist lips, open, inviting. Cloud-soft copper hair, crying out to be grabbed and held, to bring its owner close enough for a shared breath. Their glittering eyes raked the audience, seemingly able to bind everyone of the patrons to their spell, daring them to look away.

The pheromones carried by the women's siren scent would drive men out of their senses, and it struck Ayala that perhaps this was why he and Tervellyan were less affected by the sudden … sultry heaviness in the air than those around him: they had been immunized against it. The regular pre-mission cocktail of inoculations provided by Starfleet had probably included the antidote to that fabled weapon of Orion womanhood, given where they were headed and its proximity to Orion space.

For a moment the three women – one of them barely more than a girl - stood as immobile as sculptures, legs slightly apart and arms off to the side. The posture allowed the watchers to drink in the curves of their bodies, which were in no way concealed but rather accentuated by bits of a gossamer white fabric that was evidently designed to flow with any movement, even as it clung like a second skin when still. Strategic slits and dips left nothing, and everything, to the viewers imagination.

Ayala felt the eyes of one of the women come to rest on him with a laser-sharp focus that he found disconcerting, and difficult to read. Surely he was not that obvious a mark, for whatever attentions she expected to lavish on selected customers after the performance?

While he was relatively shy in these matters, he was not unaware of his physical attractiveness to women – tall, broad-shouldered, superbly fit and ruggedly handsome. But he would not flatter himself into thinking that a professional like this Orion beauty would prefer him over, say, the Andorian dignitary in the corner, who visibly dripped ice diamonds and latinum and was practically drooling in anticipation. As for Ayala, his uniform should be a warning flag to her that he was under certain … constraints when it came to mingling with alien women on a space station, even if she had not noticed his superior officer standing at the bar.

But when the three women started dancing, it was as if she, the one in the centre, the object of desire of much of the room, danced only for him. Did every man in the bar feel the same way? Every twist and turn, every undulation seemed to bring her emerald eyes back to Mike Ayala, and he found himself supremely glad of whatever immunity to the famous Orion pheromones his inoculations had bestowed upon him. Who knew what havoc her attentions would have wrought upon him otherwise? As it was, he found it difficult to tear his eyes away from her, to focus on and observe the other patrons as per his orders; instead, he felt himself drawn closer and closer to the stage as if by invisible magnetic forces. At least he knew he wasn't missing any snatches of interesting conversation around him. All conversation in the bar had stopped; even the Commander and his acquaintance had stopped their intense discussion to watch.

But no matter how dry his throat was getting, and no matter how other parts of his body were starting to respond to what he saw, Ayala didn't like the feeling of manipulation he sensed behind the performance. He deeply resented the deliberate efforts to play to his baser instincts, however objectively skilled the three women were at what they did. He could admire their superb professional skills in the abstract, but some things, this son of conservative farmer-colonists firmly believed, were best left to private quarters, and closed doors.

And yet … The lure of the one dancer, and her apparent singular focus on him, almost left him breathless. He found himself giving a sigh of relief and gratitude when his comm badge chirped and offered a welcome distraction. His Captain's voice cut through the fog.

"_Paris to away team. Please report back to the ship as soon as possible. We've got some news from our end."_

"Understood, Captain." Shaking off what remained of the cleverly engineered near-trance he had been fighting, Ayala headed over to the bar, turning his back to the dancers with a determined set of his shoulders. Brushing aside a number of utterly oblivious and blissed out patrons as he made his way through the increasingly dense crowd, he approached his XO, who had given him a questioning look and a shrug across the room at their Captain's hail.

"You ready to leave, Commander?" Ayala asked, not bothering to hide his curious scrutiny of the man who had kept Tervellyan so engrossed for the better part of an hour. The man had appeared to be human, but if from the distance Ayala had not been able to put his finger on what other species might have had a hand in his genesis, in close-up he appeared to be at least a quarter Rigellian. The prominent, high cheekbones and residual skin markings certainly were consistent. He was in civilian clothing, well-dressed, clean finger nails – a mover rather than a doer. Ayala gave him a respectful nod.

Tervellyan nodded at Ayala in response. "Yes, Lieutenant. We were just finishing our discussion. Just give me a minute."

Understanding a dismissal when he heard one, Ayala found himself at a bit of a loss as to how exactly to kill that minute. It didn't seem right to leave early and head back to Voyager without his XO – that might be interpreted as showing off. There was also the Captain's edict for the team to stay together. But how not to seem like he was listening? The solution was simple, if not perhaps entirely wise. He turned to watch the dancers some more, like everybody else.

Sure enough, the eyes of the woman who had seemed to be so intent on him before had evidently tracked his progress across the room. While moving as smoothly as before, and in almost perfect sync with the partners who flanked her on either side, Saleena – he was certain she was the one after whom the act was named, given that she seemed to be playing the central role, and holding the most eyes – now appeared entirely more focused on him than she was on the dance. Her undulations looked almost rote, distracted even, but judging by the leers and lewd comments he overheard beside and around him, Ayala was the only one to notice. And it still didn't make any sense to him.

"I'll be in touch," he heard Tervellyan say to his acquaintance, before calling out, in a slightly louder voice, to his Lieutenant.

"Ready to go, Mike?"

Ayala turned back towards his XO, glad to be able to break free from his musings, and the spell the luminous green siren seemed intent on weaving around him. "Aye, sir." Tervellyan tapped his comm badge.

"Away team to Voyager. Two to beam up." Both men straightened in anticipation of the transport signal.

As the familiar tingle began to creep across his skin, Ayala felt rather than heard the displacement of the heavy, scented air as something came hurtling towards him from the direction of the stage.

The small gasps emanating from the crowd receded into nothingness as sound stopped travelling into the in-between space he was entering, and as all other sensations ceased. The last thing Mike Ayala felt before losing molecular cohesion altogether was the impact of a solid body on his back, and the iron grip of two hands clutching at his neck.


	6. Out of the Void

**Chapter 6 – Out of the Void**

The transport operator, a Bajoran crewman on her first deep-space assignment, instinctively ducked behind her console as the ship's Chief of Security, barely materialized, jumped off his pad with the coiled force of a jungle cat, twisted in mid-air and pulled out his phaser to point it at the platform.

"Sir?" she asked, the confusion evident in her voice as it echoed in the nearly empty room. "Is something wrong?"

Ayala's phaser was pointed at thin air, or rather at Voyager's First Officer as he, in turn, stepped off the platform. Tervellyan's hands went up in mock surrender.

"Hey, what's up, Mike? Too much of that synthehol? What'd you expect – a stowaway?"

Ayala stood up from his fighting crouch and scrutinized the empty pad for a minute before holstering his weapon.

"Yes, sir," he said simply. "Someone jumped me just as the transport beam engaged. I thought they'd come out with me, and be here."

"That is impossible," Crewman Cor Zelis stated, as firmly as she dared in front of two of Voyager's senior officers, and seemingly contradicting one of them. "We set the transport for two, with the signal trained on your comm badges, so that's all the transporter would grab."

"Yeah," Tervellyan's smile had dissolved into a light frown. "You must have been mistaken, Mike. Nothing can get through the transporter unless it's set for it."

But Ayala knew what he had felt, and in the face of that dead certainty he wasn't particularly interested in being told that he was imagining a potential security breach, commanding officer or not. "With your permission, sir, I'd like a second opinion on that."

He tapped his comm badge without awaiting a response. "Transporter Room Two to Engineering. Commander Torres, would you mind coming up here? We need some advice."

Tervellyan clenched his jaw. He really was getting tired of these 'old Voyagers', as he had started to think of them, running their own channels of communications around him. If they were doing so right in front of him, just what might be going on behind his back that he, as the Executive Officer, should be aware of?

"I don't think you need to engage the Chief on this, Ayala. You heard the operator. She's the expert. The transporter wouldn't have grabbed anyone else, when it was set for two."

Ayala considered his XO briefly, but stood his ground. "Captain Riker went into a transporter and got split into two identical halves. I've seen it set to retrieve two people and spit out one, spliced," he said simply. "And not even the same total body mass. We sent that one guy back into the buffer and got two people back out – complete as before, no bits missing. Personally, I have no idea what happened to them in between, like to the mass we didn't retrieve when the spliced guy came out. Stands to reason it can be set for one, and pick up two. Just a question of where the other body is being kept until someone asks for it. I don't understand this stuff, but Commander Torres sure does."

He paused after this unusually long speech, and looked at his XO expectantly. Tervellyan's jaw clenched a little, but he had to admit the man had a point. Besides, he couldn't very well take the position that having the Chief check out the transporter was in any way problematic. Deciding to put the best face on the matter, he nodded and informed the bridge that he and Ayala were back on board as ordered, and were investigating a possible security breach during their return. He even managed to muster a smile when B'Elanna spilled out of the turbolift and into the transporter room with her usual energetic stride.

She listened attentively to Ayala's description of what had happened to him in the bar, and to Zelis' theory on the limitations of transporters. Tervellyan made the obvious connection, essentially putting his seal of approval on Ayala's out-of-turn request.

"So in other words, Commander, we'd like your view of whether this … alleged _passenger_ could be stuck somewhere in the pattern buffer."

B'Elanna's thoughtful gaze flitted from one to the other. "Of course they could," she replied, carefully schooling her voice to be free of any tone that could be interpreted as anything sounding like a 'duh'. If there was one thing she prided herself on, it was the fact that however impatient she could be with people who did not perform to their abilities, she would never berate anyone for a mere lack of knowledge.

Transporter technology, like temporal dynamics, was a fairly niche specialty even for the geekiest of physicists and engineers, and it was really only due to the many malfunctions Voyager had experienced in the Delta Quadrant - and the odd uses to which they had at times been forced to put the device - that she had acquired any expertise in it. Even an engineer by training, like Tervellyan had been before he switched to the command stream, could be forgiven for not knowing its intricacies.

"The rule about 'one in, one out' is a matter of expectations and statistics, not physics," she explained. "When it comes to the standard transporter models, any unexpected bio signs that invade a previously-set transport matrix are stored in the pattern buffer for a limited period of time. That's essentially how we filter out bacteria and undesirable parasites, from people we send on away missions. The retention is so that we can get a sample if we need one; usually those impurities or byproducts of transport just get deleted from the buffer on a twenty-four hour cycle. On the other hand, if the transporter hasn't read a given matrix before, and gets_ told_ to bring up a life form whose data it hasn't stored, in the absence of a tag or a comm badge it assumes you want the closest humanoid to the coordinates. So the basics is that, no - transporters _don't_ just bring up what they're told."

"But what if it wasn't _told_ to take up two, wouldn't it just take one, especially if that person had a comm badge, and leave the other behind?" Zelis was intrigued. While she had been trained in in transporter physics and mechanics, like most transport operators, the education had been basic and she was expected to learn on the job – and obviously eager to do so. B'Elanna made a mental note to mention this to Tom. Maybe they should have the occasional evening or lunchtime seminar, to give their younger and less experienced crew members some pointers on the crap that _could _and _did_ happen in the real world? Tales from the Delta Quadrant, as learning opportunities? The idea had potential.

"Normally, yes. But if the proximity is extreme, the transporters take up the whole mass but filter out the un-stored matrix as unwanted biomatter, like it would a … a leech. And if the transporter is programmed differently, like that one-way gizmo of LaForge's, it catches _everybody _within a certain radius, and spits them all out at destination. That doesn't apply here, but the point is, it's not all in the setting."

"How long before a stored extraneous pattern decays?" Tervellyan asked.

"Twenty-four standard hours are the official safety margin," B'Elanna replied as she headed over to the console. "Same time as the regular purge. We used that as a guide when we hid some telepaths in the pattern buffers against detection by a bunch of xenophobes. But Will Riker once told Tom and me about the Enterprise finding a guy who'd been in a buffer for seventy-five years, and all _he_ needed to realign his molecules was a stiff Scotch. So, personally, I think sell-by dates are highly negotiable."

She punched in a few commands, frowned and hit her comm badge. "Torres to Paris. Tom, we've confirmed we had an intruder attempt."

"Don't you mean intruder _alert_?" Tom's voice came from the turbolift rather than the comm line. Knowing that nothing would have kept Janeway out of the transporter room in a situation like this, he had decided to check matters out for himself. Captain's privilege.

"If the person had actually made it onboard, yes," his wife informed him drily. "But he or she is presently stuck in the pattern buffer. Judging by the molecular structure and quantities, I'd say adult humanoid, about my size."

"Can you get him – or her – out?"

Tom and Tervellyan had both walked over to the transporter console to inspect B'Elanna's data, with Zelis standing on her tip-toes behind them, trying to catch a glimpse. Tom moved aside to let her have a look. He was, after all, just a spectator, while she had the opportunity to stretch her professional horizons.

"Should be able to," B'Elanna said. "The problem is, I can't tell you who and what you might be getting. A nice little old Vulcan lady with a copy of the Dictates of Poetry - or a pissed off Romulan with a disruptor."

Tom gave Ayala a little wink at that last comment. "Good point," he noted. "Computer, erect a Level 10 force field around the transporter platform."

He turned to Zelis. "Make sure the bio filters are still engaged, given where he or she is coming from."

"Aye, sir. Done."

He nodded his acknowledgment. "Energize."

The figure materialized before them in a half-crouch, arms outstretched and slightly curled, like someone who had jumped a considerable distance and was holding on, as tightly as possible, to the body – no longer there – on which she had briefly landed.

She.

A vision in diaphanous white fabric that was clinging precariously to her voluptuous curves. A light sheen of perspiration coated the translucent green skin of her exquisite face and the soft swell of her partly exposed, perfectly shaped breasts. The cloud of red hair that framed her head almost seemed to float a little on its own, free of gravity - likely the result of her prolonged sojourn in the pattern buffer, but also an uncomfortable reminder of what they had seen on board the abandoned freighter less than a day ago.

Emerald eyes opened wide - first in fear, then, as she took in the uniforms of the officers in the room, in something close to relief. Or was it triumph? She gulped for air, catching a breath still ragged from the leap of faith she had just completed.

"It's one of the dancers from the lounge," Tervellyan announced, not bothering to conceal his astonishment. He had seen her on the stage – who could have missed her entrance? – but at the beam-out, his eyes had been turned towards his acquaintance, and he had not seen the body that had hurled itself at Ayala's tall form. "What the hell …"

The Orion woman's initial reaction to her new surroundings vanished quickly, and she began to look uncertain and wary as her eyes darted from one officer to the other, gauging threat, expecting … what? She took a deep breath and shrank as if from an anticipated slap, before sinking gracefully on her knees. Tom's breath hitched in his throat as he recalled the last time he had seen that gesture of supplication, of utter submission to a superior will.

Still behind the force field, she spread her arms and, head bowed, uttered a single word, in Standard. Spoken clearly, despite whatever apprehension she obviously felt and whatever punishment she seemed prepared to accept, that word rang out in the transporter room - more like an accusation than a plea:

"Asylum."

…..

"Captain. May I have a moment before the briefing?"

The First Officer stood at the entrance to the Captain's ready room, in the classic Starfleet at ease position. But there was nothing _at ease_ about the expression on his face.

Tom had a feeling he knew what was coming: The nanoprobes. Tervellyan's jaw had clenched in a most unpleasant manner when he had been apprised of what he and Ayala had missed while they were in the bar, and Tom had been bracing himself for the inevitable questions ever since. He nodded, expecting the challenge.

He was right.

"Was it a question of trust?" Tervellyan asked as soon as the door whooshed shut behind him. He barely managed to conceal the anger in his voice. "I'd been hoping we knew each other well enough that …"

"No, no of course it wasn't," Tom tried to put as much reassurance into his voice as he could, without sounding patronizing or dismissive.

He wondered briefly whether it would be wise to tell Jarod just why he had hesitated to make his idea known – should a Captain admit to being the victim of insecurity? Janeway never would have … But he was Tom Paris, not Kathryn Janeway, and so he followed his gut.

"Frankly, Jarod, I wasn't sure whether it would work, and I didn't want to look like an idiot with my first bright idea from the Captain's chair. That's it. Nothing personal."

Tom remembered, somewhat uncomfortably, the weeks of tension in Voyager's command team after Chakotay learned that he'd been deliberately left out of the loop regarding Tom's undercover mission to unmask a Kazon spy. But that decision had been taken with the ex-Maquis' potential conflict of interest in mind and Chakotay had been justified in being pissed off; trust _had, _in fact, come into it, however implicitly. Quite a difference between that, and what he had done, Tom reasoned, but nonetheless an apology was probably warranted.

"Look, I'm sorry. In retrospect, I realize I should have told you. _And _Asil, _and_ Ayala, too. If it's any consolation, my own wife didn't know about this. Just me and the medical team. B'Elanna's already accused me of liking the Doc better than her," he concluded, even as he realized that attempts at humour on this issue would probably fall flat for a while.

"The important thing is that it worked, and we have a heck of a lot more to go on than Starfleet has ever had before."

Tervellyan did not seem particularly mollified. In fact, his jaw was grinding a little, and he looked paler than usual. When he spoke, Tom had the uneasy feeling that he really wanted to say something else, and restricted himself to the words he did use only by superior force of will.

"I cannot be expected to do my job if you don't let me into your confidence in something as basic as this … _Captain." _His expression, and the little hesitation, made it clear that he had considered using Tom's name, but opted for formality instead. Had something been lost between them already?

Tervellyan opened his mouth to say more, but Tom decided that he'd heard enough. Luckily, he _was_ the Captain, and even in the face of what was likely his first major screw-up as a commanding officer, there was always that magic sentence that would end all uncomfortable discussion:

"Your concerns have been duly noted, _Commander_. Dismissed."

Tervellyan glared at him and nodded curtly, before turning around on his heel and heading for the briefing room.

Tom, for his part, found himself wondering how quickly, how readily he had seized on that particular out - so familiar from discussions with his father throughout his adolescence, causing a little piece of him to die every time he heard it: _Your objections have been duly noted, Thomas, now do as you're told. _

How often did Starfleet Captains find themselves using that line on their first officers, for the sake of convenience or the expediency of command? But at what cost to themselves? He had often suspected, when Chakotay had stormed out of the ready room with a particularly black glower on his face, that Janeway took frequent recourse to it as well. Was that why the former Maquis Captain now lived with Seven of Nine, and not with the woman he had so clearly worshipped during the early part of their journey?

Tom took a deep breath, gritted his teeth and followed his XO into the briefing room. Everyone was sitting at full attention around the table; only the Doctor was missing. At Tom's request, Icheb had been invited to participate. Sitting ramrod straight, his senior cadet uniform impeccable, the young man tried very hard not to look too chuffed about the honour of his first appearance in the senior officer's circle – before having formally earned his ensign's pip.

B'Elanna shifted her gaze curiously from Tervellyan to Tom and back, and pursed her lips in silent consideration of the evident tension between the two men. Tom ignored her and proceeded straight into the meeting. Might as well take the bull by the horn.

"There are a couple of issues to discuss. First, our unexpected 'guest' is in Sickbay for now, getting checked out for the Magellanic virus and whatever else she might have been exposed to, given the manner in which she arrived here. I've asked the Doctor to bring her up when they – and we – are ready, at which point I hope that she can shed some light on what or where those dead women we found might have been destined for."

He let that thought float in the air for a moment before continuing. "So let's start with the item that's most relevant to our immediate mission. The nanoprobe marking scheme, as you know, has worked and we now have incontrovertible proof that Federation antigen deliveries are being diverted illegally. The one route we know of leads out of the Narov system and to this station. The sample Mike brought back from Kalpak confirms this."

Tom briefly cast an apologetic look over to Jarod Tervellyan. He noticed – and deeply appreciated - Tervellyan's apparent effort at outwardly maintaining his equanimity, in the process not providing an opening for the other officers to register the same, not entirely unjustified, complaint. Leaving nearly the entire senior staff in ignorance of a major element of the mission was something Janeway had done in a pinch, but not usually to protect her own ego … Tom decided to punch that thought down again, for future consideration. As far as everyone else was concerned, the secrecy had been due to operational security issues.

Asil spared him the need to continue for the moment by interjecting, "Based on our calculations, the entire shipment Voyager delivered to Nemoth II was brought here, although most of it remains on the Rigellian freighter. If one assumes the motive behind the diversion to be profit, that is not logical. The need, and hence the willingness of individuals to pay for the antigen, is greater on the planets within the system."

Tom gave her a rueful look. "You're forgetting about the previous shipments. One lot did go to Nemoth; presumably that's being sold there as we speak. The shipment the Federation had us bring there was essentially gravy, and may now be destined for Rigel, Betelgeuse or any other of the systems in the neighbourhood. Given how quickly the virus spread through the Snowflakes, it stands to reason people nearby are getting nervous and would be ready to pay a premium for a vaccine."

Asil frowned a little as she tried to puzzle out his vernacular, but Tom continued without enlightening her. There would be other opportunities for that.

B'Elanna nodded. "Whoever is picking up our shipments is probably well connected enough to know that there is more headed into the Snowflakes; we've only made three deliveries out of eight due to the disturbances."

"That's right," Tom continued. "Now that we know where the antigen Voyager took to Nemoth II ended up, our next step should be to trace the exact course of that Rigellian vessel and see if we can determine at which point it took possession of our shipment. That should tell us something about how they carry out the diversions. Asil, anything?"

"The warp signature we detected leads back on a vector directly towards Nemoth II. I do not believe that there has been a significant detour in the ship's course, so it stands to reason that the handover was quite possibly a direct one."

"No middle man," Tom mused. "Interesting." He looked from Asil to Ayala, and to Tervellyan. "Is there a way we can get that ship's transporter coordinates? I'm wondering whether our signals were simply deflected straight to them. There was so much traffic in orbit around the planet that identifying the destination point for any diversion would have been tricky at best."

"I'll look at our logs, and see if someone else's signal piggy-backed onto the receptor," B'Elanna offered. "Any deflection would have been seriously encrypted, but we should be able to identify it, now that we know what we might be looking for."

"I may be able to assist, Commander," Icheb offered eagerly. "Multiple signal overlay is something I am familiar with … from … " Tom thanked him quickly, to spare him having to finish the sentence. No matter how ready he was to draw on his experiences as a Borg drone for the benefit of his fellow shipmates or a mission, Icheb had never been particularly comfortable reminding people – or himself, for that matter – of his former existence.

Ayala cleared his throat and turned to Tervellyan. He had become less reticent to speak up during briefings since taking up his position as Chief of Security, but still did not do so easily. Given his earlier exchange with the XO, though, and his residual displeasure at having been essentially left to his own devices on the station, he could not stop a slight challenge from creeping into his voice.

"In all that excitement with the transporter, we haven't heard from the Commander what he might have learned from his … acquaintance on Kolpak."

"Yes, Jarod – did you get anything useful?" Tom, blissfully unaware of any subtext between his two officers, looked at Tervellyan expectantly.

The Commander shrugged. "A mixed bag. The place is apparently run by a Board of Directors who want to set it up as the gateway to the Snowflakes, once trade routes to and from the Federation are formally agreed. They're focusing on entertainment and supplies. Right now they've got a steady stream of diplomats running through, with individual member planets of the Federation apparently trying to negotiate most favoured partner status _before_ the heavy hand of the Council comes down. The dilithium deposits on some of the inner planets are apparently as attractive to potential investors as shit is to flies. A bunch of Andorians are there now, government officials, stuck because of the quarantine but reluctant to leave in case someone else gets there first."

He paused and shrugged. "And then there's the usual nefarious space station stuff going on, like a seriously tightly run Dabo table that he thinks might serve as a money laundry for someone; he wasn't sure who. Funny enough, though, my contact did _not_ mention the antigen being available, but maybe he didn't know about it."

"Wonder whether the Council knows about its members trying to pre-empt a Federal treaty," Tom mused. In response to Ayala's questioning look, he added, "Any agreement a member has entered into,_ before_ the Federation gets around to making arrangements on behalf of everybody, trumps. And those Andorians – I trust them about as far as I can throw their jerk of an emperor. Good stuff, Jarod. We have to make sure to pass that little tidbit up the line."

Pablo Baytart had been doing a little tapping on a PADD on his lap during his XO's summary, and handed it over to Icheb for a second opinion. Icheb added a command or two and handed it back with a nod, whereupon Baytart made a little hand motion to ask for the floor. He was still getting used to his role as senior officer and tended to be a bit shy at meetings, but his familiarity with Voyager and Tom as his superior officer had helped him find his feet pretty quickly. In fact, Tom had been pleased to see how quickly the potential he had always seen in the generally reticent junior pilot was beginning to assert itself. The conn division ran as smoothly as it ever had during his day, he was convinced; someone had even mentioned the emergence of a betting pool.

"Sir, I've just done a quick-and-dirty correlation of our course with the most likely one of the Rigellian freighter that's got our antigen aboard. Icheb just confirmed that my calculations check out. If they came here directly from Nemoth II, with necessary adjustments due to the conditions in the system, there is a one-cubic parsec overlap area with our own course coming in from Parok and Arren. And that area of overlap – wait for it - includes the location where we found the vessel with those dead women. Which was also Rigellian. So I'm wondering …"

"… whether they may have picked up the escape pods en route? Brilliant, guys." Tom grinned approvingly at both men.

He turned to the Ops officer. "Asil, can you do a discrete check on that ship for residual additional propulsion signatures, as soon as we're done here? Let me know what you find. We may need to have a much closer look at this vessel." He opened his mouth to add something, but was interrupted by a chirp from the bridge.

"Captain," Schmidt's voice came over the comm, totally neutral, devoid of any inflection and all business. The man had learned long ago, by necessity and circumstance, never to give anything away when it mattered. "We're being hailed from the station. They're wondering whether we have seen one of their dancers. She seems to have disappeared and for some reason they believe she may be onboard _Voyager_."

Tom suppressed an approving smile at Schmidt's discrete phrasing – the caller was clearly still on the line - and asked him to put it through.

"What seems to be the problem, Mr. …?" he asked blandly, when the unknown Narovian became visible on the main view screen. As far as he was concerned, the onus was on the other party to state his name and his business, before he would introduce himself. How had they put it in the 20th century? "It's your nickel, sir." Whatever a nickel was.

"Station Chief Cheroth," the man said curtly. "I have been advised that one of the dancers in the Snowflake Lounge may have tried to escape by jumping on one of your crew members as he was beaming out, presumably back to your ship. Yours is the only Starfleet vessel at the station, and the man's uniform was clearly identified."

Ayala moved his chair back a little, to ensure that he would stay out of viewing range, while Tom schooled his face into an approximation of disdainful superiority. The Doc had been a good teacher …

"Captain Tom Paris, USS Voyager. It is common knowledge, Chief Cheroth, that transporters only beam up those whom they've locked onto. Only the two officers we had set to beam out showed up on our transporter platform." The truth and nothing but the truth, even if perhaps not the_ whole_ truth.

For good measure, Tom added, "You're welcome to check our transporter log for the incoming arrival."

He treated his interlocutor to a slightly conspiratorial smile now, with widened blue eyes whose innocence would have fooled no one who had ever served with Tom Paris for longer than twenty minutes.

"But I do have one question in return, if I may. You said your dancer _tried to escape? _Just what would he or she be escaping _from_, exactly? Not _dancing_, surely? And if she wanted to leave the station, why wouldn't she just have booked transport off? Or asked to hitch a ride with someone?"

He managed to sound genuinely confused now, and Asil's eyebrow shot up briefly in admiration of his performance.

Cheroth's eyes, in turn, shifted a little to the side as he realized what had to have been a slip of the tongue on his part. He licked his lips before replying, in a less than steady voice, "I believe she might have been … worried about the Magellanic virus. You see, the stories about it are spreading, and some of the girls, especially the ones from Orion, aren't all that … sophisticated. They don't understand that the vaccine we managed to acquire will protect them."

"Ah yes, the vaccine. You're very lucky to have procured a shipment, Chief. I hear it's hard to come by in these parts. May I ask how you managed to get it?"

The Chief's eyes narrowed speculatively, and he pulled himself up in his seat a little. "I'm not here to answer your questions, Captain, about matters of commerce that are frankly none of Starfleet's business."

Tom raised his hands in a mock-defensive gesture, and smiled sweetly. Of course the guy would know to the parsec how far his station was outside Federation jurisdiction… The location of the place was no accident, that much was clear.

"No offence meant, Chief. Just curious, and in the spirit of cooperation, of course. You know that we are here on a humanitarian mission to deliver antigen vials for the sector, and I want to ensure that our efforts are not … unnecessary. Especially given that what you're selling has our insignia on it. Which, with all due respect, makes it my business."

Cheroth had made a full recovery by now, and his reply came promptly, as if well-rehearsed. "I assure you that any Starfleet antigen on this station was provided by the Narovian authorities, in order to pre-empt further spread of the virus. I would be grateful if you could transmit your transporter log to the station so we can verify your statement."

"Consider it done," Tom replied in clipped tones, unwilling to prolong an unproductive discussion any longer than he had to. "Paris out."

He cut the comm link unceremoniously – rudeness had its advantages - and looked around the table.

"Well, that was certainly interesting," he said to no one in particular. "Apart from that bullshit line about how they got the antigen. So, or dancer _escaped_. She certainly seemed to think so, and judging what happened to her colleagues on that freighter, her concerns seem to be somewhat justified."

He tapped his comm badge. "Paris to Sickbay. Is your patient ready to come and talk to us about … her request for asylum?"

"We'll have her ready to come up and see you in a few minutes, Captain," the EMH said over the comm link. "And yes, I don't think a crowd is what she needs at this time. She does, however, appear to have formed a … bit of a bond with Nurse Tval."

Tom nodded slowly. "Understood. Please have Tval bring her to my ready room. Jarod and I will speak with her; Tval can stay if that would make her more comfortable."

Directing himself at the officers around the table, he summarized their discussion so far. "So this is where we're at: We have one freighter at Kalpak station, crewed by Rigellians, Narovians and Orions, carrying contraband consisting of diverted medication. A highly valuable commodity during a pandemic. We have another freighter, carrying eighteen dead Orion women, by all appearances what's known as 'Orion slave girls' – surely a highly valuable commodity in their own right. It, too, was crewed by Rigellians, Narovians and Orions, and travelling near Kalpak station. And its crew was likely picked up by the first ship."

Ayala cleared his throat to interject. "One more fact in this context, sir. I saw at least three Orions at the Dabo tables, and the three dancers. And the place runs around the clock. They either have, or could use, more."

Tom nodded his thanks. "And one of them may or may not have _escaped_ from Kalpak Station, from whatever she was doing there as part of that group. I see a picture emerging, but to get better granularity we need a few more dots to connect. See if you can find them. Let's see what a detailed scan of the Rigellian ship might yield. The Commander, Tval and I will talk to our …our guest. We'll convene another briefing at 17:00 hours. Dismissed."


	7. Awakenings

**Chapter 7 - Awakenings**

"I'm Tom Paris, Captain of the Federation Starship Voyager. This is my First Officer, Commander Jarod Tervellyan. And you are … Saleena, I believe?" Tom kept his tone firm but kind, not certain what to expect, but wanting to ensure that the Orion woman – more a girl, really, she seemed so young now that he got a closer look at her – would not be frightened off by the men in uniform.

She surprised him with a voice that was soft, but clear and determined even as her eyes remained lowered.

"Saleena is not my name, nor is it that of any of the others who dance … danced … with me. It is a name often given to _lodubyaln. _It is intended make us more desirable to those who watch us dance, and those who want to have us. I was, and am, Lemarr."

The Orion almost seemed to expect that they would question her claim to the name, which was delivered in a lilting accent, ending on a purr. She did not look up, keeping her eyes downcast and her head held in what seemed to Tom to be trained submissive behaviour, rather than a natural gesture of respect or deference.

"Do not be afraid to look at me—at us, Lemarr, if you wish to do so," he said, gently. "No harm will befall you on this ship. No one will judge you. You are safe here. You have my word."

She wrapped herself more tightly into the large uniform jacket Ayala had hung over her shoulders when he had first taken her to Sickbay. She was wearing freshly replicated coveralls now but had apparently refused to part with the jacket, as if it represented something much more than mere warmth. It covered nearly her entire body as she sat tightly curled up on the couch in the ready room, including the small feet she had pulled up underneath herself.

"Do you have a family name?"

Tom's inquiry was kind, but matter-of-fact. If they wanted to trace her on any Federation or other accessible database, they would need more than a first name that apparently hadn't been used in years.

"I do not. Not now." She did look up at that and her eyes, directed now at the star-filled window over Tervellyan's shoulder, held the spark of a challenge that Tom could not help but like. "I used to be Lemarr Valon. But my parents gave up their right to have me honour their name when they sold me."

"Sold?" Jarod could not help the touch of skepticism that inflected his voice.

Lemarr raised her eyes to Tom's at this implicit challenge, and for the first time allowed him to look fully into their emerald depths. What he saw in those eyes took his breath away. Not for their undeniable, staggering beauty, but because they told him a story he understood only too well. He was grateful that Tvar's empathic powers had, from the time she had entered the ready room with her charge, been focused solely on the young woman beside her; she had spared neither him nor the First Officer a glance since her arrival.

But Tom Paris knew, as surely as he knew his own name and the hell he had lived through in a New Zealand jail, that Lemarr was speaking the truth. He held out his hand as if to ward off any further skeptical questions from his XO, and nodded encouragingly at the Orion woman to explain.

"On my world, it is common for poor families to sell one or more of their own to become _lodubyaln_. Mostly we are girls, sometimes boys. If they are pretty enough." Tom flinched a little as Lemarr continued. "We are sent into your worlds, in the worlds where the grey uniforms go. There, _lodubyaln_ become dancers and companions for the night. If they give pleasure to the customers, they bring riches to their owners, and this is how the contract is served."

"_Owners_? No one is permitted to own another sentient being," Tervellyan interjected softly, but with conviction, over Tom's hissed protest. "At least not in Federation space, and stations like this have to respect Federation law even if it doesn't formally apply."

"Do you not know what it means, _lodubyaln_?" Her tone was still soft, but urgent now. "We are called 'Orion slave girls' even in your worlds, Commander. I have heard this. I know this." Lemarr let her huge eyes alternate between the XO and the Captain, the challenge unmistakable now, despite her overtly deferential demeanour.

"Is it so hard to believe that it means what it says? Or do you wish to believe that the dancers you watch and want, are there because they _want_ to be watched, and _want_ to lie with everyone who wants them? Some do this work because they like to be watched and lie with men, it is true, and in days gone by it was always like this. And some enter into the contract willingly, because they wish to leave their family and this is the only way they know. But many, most do not want this life. Many are children when they become _lodubyaln _and must do as they are told by their fathers. I was a child. In the end, it makes no difference to the customers whether you wish it or not. They do not ask. But it always matters to us who have no voice. _It is_ _not right_."

All three officers had remained silent during this simple speech. The expression on Tervellyan's face had become unreadable while Tvar, seated beside Lemarr, lifted her black Betazoid eyes to Tom's. Her slight nod and the tears now rolling down her cheeks told him what he already knew: The young woman was speaking the truth.

He had not doubted it, and an icy fist closed around his gut as he thought of other … possessions - the hateful breaths, the laughter, the vile touch of those who took in fear or in pain what no one should have to surrender unwillingly. Those who would defile the beauty that should be the giving of one's self to another, in love and trust.

No, it was not right. He willed his hands to open when he felt his nails digging into his palm.

Lemarr continued, almost matter-of-factly, as before. But she looked at Tom now, directly, and without fear. She knew that she was being heard, and it was enough. For now, it was enough. And it was good.

"My father made a contract for me, for twenty years. For twenty years I must serve them. Dance, make holovids, lie with customers, do what they want. And give the owners most of my earnings. They let me keep a little, so I would have hope, so I would not end my life. In exchange, they said my brothers and sisters are now well cared for. And I am supposed to be to be grateful."

"Them? They?" Tom's eyes narrowed, and if his friend Harry had been present, he would have recognized the feral glint in them – the hunter, picking up a scent; the fighter, a cause.

"They. The Syndicate. They did not exist in the old days. They do now."

Tervellyan sucked in a breath and shook his head as if in denial, while Tval cast a frowning questioning look at Tom.

"The Orion Crime Syndicate." Tom's addition was not a question, rather an explanation for the nurse's benefit. Lemarr gave a simple nod, _yes_.

"They are responsible for your coming to Kalpak?"

"All _lodubyaln_ are brought to their places by the Syndicate. There are many of us at Kalpak. Dancing, working at the Dabo tables, and servicing customers."

"Do they … the Syndicate … send out all _lodubyaln _to work?"

"Not those who work willingly; they only work on our home world. All who are sent to work on other worlds, where the profits are greater, are owned by the Syndicate."

Tom whistled silently, and looked over at his XO who was shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

"And now they have started transporting medicine? Any other stolen goods you know of?"

"I got to Kalpak on a ship owned by the Syndicate. As for other goods, I do not know. I am _lodubyaln_. My knowledge is limited."

Tom nodded his thanks to her. It was clear to him that she had told them what she knew, for now.

"Thank you, Lemarr," he said softly. He felt the urge to hold her, to give her some of the warmth he felt for her, but he knew his touch would not be welcome for some time. "Thank you for trusting us with your story. Do you have any questions for us?"

She looked at him. "Can you say I am sorry to the one who carried me to the ship? I did not ask if he wished to help me. I took from him, without asking. It is not right."

Tom and his First Officer exchanged glances. Tervellyan's earlier skepticism had been replaced by what Tom saw as growing sympathy, mixed with something he could not quite put his finger on. Disgust? Sometimes it puzzled him how little he could read his XO, despite his admittedly uncommon ability to decipher almost anyone else. He knew he himself could be a blank at times, even to a Betazoid …

"You can tell him yourself," Jarod said, his tone neutral, but not unkind. "That is his jacket you are wearing; he gave it to you in the transporter room, remember? So I'm sure he didn't really mind that you hitched a ride with him."

He nodded to Tvar as the two women rose to leave. "Please take her to one of our guest quarters, Nurse Tvar, and check that she has everything she needs. And ask Mike to send a security detail to … to make sure Lemarr feels safe in her quarters."

Tom nodded his approval, both at the directive and the precaution it reflected. Her affecting and devastating story notwithstanding – Lemarr _was_ a stowaway and protocol dictated that she should be watched. But his gut told him that she was no threat; the contrary was more likely, given what she had dared to expose.

After the door had closed, Tervellyan turned to Tom, a frown on his face. "Hard to believe that what I've heard and seen of Orion dancers has been an act. They are … pretty convincing, on many levels. Lemarr herself – you should have seen her on that stage, Tom. Hard to believe that was just an act."

Tom took his XO's measure carefully. "Well, the women of the old stories, from the days pre-dating the Syndicate, were probably for real. And what we see now is a copy of what had the Federation outlaw the use of their pheromones. But anyone can put up an act for anything, if sufficiently motivated. And if the Syndicate has a hold over her, believe me, the motivation to put on a convincing show will be pretty solid."

He remained silent for a long moment. Looking back on the last twenty-four hours, what he had seen and heard pointed to one single, devastating conclusion, and his visceral reaction to it almost dwarfed his reaction to the diversion of the much-needed antigen they had come to investigate. He rolled the word around in his mouth, nearly gagging at its bitter taste before he spat it out to his First Officer.

"_Slavery_, Jarod. _Slavery. _That's what she escaped from. I think the reason those women we found were in the cargo hold wasn't because someone wanted to get them out of the way when the ship started to fall apart, or because they didn't have enough escape pods and didn't want a scene. The reason they were in that hold cargo is because that is _precisely_ what they were. Cargo. Commodities for trade, in the new routes that are opening up in the Snowflakes. Valuable, sure, but not taken into consideration when it came to equipping that freighter with escape pods."

He took a deep breath. "I guess we've been blind to what was right before our eyes. Kahless, we even called those women what they were: _Orion slave girls_. Didn't think about it twice. I know I didn't. But all this time, thanks to the Orion Syndicate and tens of thousands of oblivious customers, the slave trade has been alive and well in the Alpha Quadrant all this time."

Tervellyan said nothing, but nodded slowly, as if confirming to himself a realization he had spent the last half hour working through. His jaw was set, and the closed look that had crept over his face told Tom that his XO was as appalled by what he had heard as he was, even if there were some depths of understanding with regard to Lemarr's story he could never reach.

"Captain, I believe we have found what we were looking for on the Rigellian freighter," Asil's uninflected voice came over the comm system.

Tom and Tervellyan entered the bridge to find the Ops officer and Icheb bent over her console. Asil looked up at her Captain's approaching step and tapped a command that routed what they had ben looking at onto the main view screen: The schematic of the freighter, as before, but this time with four dark, solid shapes clustered in one of the shuttle bays.

"We were unable to trace any residual signatures from the escape pods. However, Lieutenant Baytart suggested that there might be a difference in the materials used to construct Rakota and Worfin class ships, since the former are considerably older in design and construction. Cadet Icheb has done the necessary research and has been able to confirm that since the Rakota line was discontinued, there have been advances in hull construction, including a 3.78 percent presence of certain new duranium alloys that are used both in the newer vessels themselves and in all ancillary craft. Our multispectral analysis shows that indeed, the four smaller units match the alloy predominant when the Rakota line was still being built."

Tom continued for her. "And it would be logical that the four small vessels in the shuttle bay are the escape pods from the Rakota-class ship we found."

"Precisely, Captain."

"Would it also be logical to assume that the people running our drugs through the Snowflakes, and those who traffic in Orion women, are part of the same outfit?"

"We have insufficient evidence to come to this conclusion at this time, Captain, but it would not be inconsistent with the facts we have encountered so far."

High praise of his deductive reasoning, coming from a Vulcan, Tom decided.

"Good work, team," he said, smiling particularly warmly at Icheb. The young man nodded, in an attempt at nonchalance that did not even come close to succeeding.

…..

Tom looked around the briefing table where he had assembled his officers again. Did Janeway ever have more than one briefing during a single shift? He supposed she had, and he remembered at least one such get-together that had lasted the better part of a shift.

At least Voyager wasn't flying right now; she was still in a stationary position above – not docked at – Kalpak station. As good a time as any for brainstorming. He needed options, and after his regrettable misstep with Tervellyan and the nanoprobes consultation looked like the way to go.

"Okay, folks. Here are the facts: We have evidence that the Rigellian vessel has stolen Starfleet property onboard, but they've got a dampening field around their cargo bay so we can't transport it out. We're outside Federation jurisdiction, without access to search warrants for a private vessel. Good news is that no one can yell at us for going in without one, either, so I feel perfectly free to play cowboy."

He ignored Asil's momentarily puzzled glance at the obscure reference, and continued.

"So, in short, we need to board the Rigellian vessel in order to both recover the antigen and to find out how where they picked it up, since we still haven't been able to trace the transporter diversion from our end. While we're there we should try and determine the identity of the people they took onboard, since there won't be an investigation done by anyone else out here and some of the people implicated appear to come from a Federation planet. I assume we haven't been able to identify them through existing DNA databases? That would be too easy, right?"

The EMH shook his head in agreement. "The Orions and Narovians aren't linked into the Federation data base, and the Rigellian Supremacy has a privacy protocol in place that prohibits direct access without official Rigellian authorization."

Tom snorted contemptuously. So much for a Federation with common systems, shared information, interoperability, trust among allies … . "Great. So, if we want to do DNA matches, we'll either have to wave tricorders at people we don't actually want to come across, or look for hairbrushes in the crew quarters. I need options, folks. As I said, the only one I can see so far is boarding the Rigellian and looking for clues ourselves. Jarod?"

Tervellyan shrugged. "Dangerous, of course, especially if there are Syndicate members aboard, rather than just hired minions. Might be easier to send someone to the station and hack into their systems. Kalpak will have the crew manifests and flight plans on record, at the very least."

B'Elanna couldn't hide her skepticism. "Sorry Commander, but do you really think that people who steal medicine and take in murderers would file _crew manifests and flight plans?" _

"Actually, that's not so far off, B'Elanna," Tom came to his XO's defence before he could reply. "The Syndicate usually works _with_ the local authorities, at least to a some extent – outwardly playing by the rules so they won't attract the attention of anyone they can't bribe. Whether or not they file correct information is another matter, of course. But we should be able to find out at least how often that freighter has been here in the last few months, and what routings they've _claimed_ to have flown. We can learn a lot from cross checks with what _we_ know."

He looked to Tervellyan with calculation in his eyes. "Based on what I remember from the Kirk Centre, you're quite the hacker, Jarod. So, as I recall, is Icheb. We can't get at the necessary systems from the outside though, so let's discuss tactical options. Anyone?"

"In the Maquis, we managed to board a couple Starfleet vessels by rigging regulation comm badges to emit scrambled signals," Ayala offered. "Any computer that picked up an unauthorized life sign, it got shown a Turellian rat or some other vermin."

B'Elanna flashed him a brief grin at some mercifully obscure shared memory, and nodded. "I remember hearing about that one," she said. "Shouldn't be a problem."

Asil raised an eyebrow. "May I inquire how the Maquis got their hands on Starfleet communications badges?"

Tom shook his head. "I'm sure we don't really want to know, Lieutenant. At least this time, the badges will be legit."

A plan was quickly developed. Ayala would take Icheb on board the Rigellian ship and would attempt to download the ship's logs. A transporter lock would be maintained on them at all time.

"We're particularly interested in transporter logs and actual – not programmed - flight plans. We need info on their port of origin, and routing through the Narov system since they showed up here. Crew manifests would be a bonus. Download as much as you can to Voyager's computer, and we'll sort through it here."

Both men nodded their acceptance, Icheb with eyes that could be only described as shining with an excitement that gave Tom the briefest of pauses. Was it fair to ask this much from a student doing his practicum, still without official status as an officer? Then again, he knew what the former Borg drone was capable of, and he had no doubt that his current practical assignment on Voyager would confirm that he was ready to graduate – two years ahead of his class. But Icheb's education had begun long before then, in so many ways, and as he was eighteen now he was permitted to engage in kinetic operations. More importantly, Tom remembered another first-timer, just out of the Academy and still damp behind the ears, who had risen to answer every challenge presented to him …

Bottom line, in the absence of a Harry Kim, Icheb was the best person for the job and it would be counter-productive to choose someone less suited. He quirked the young man a quick, encouraging smile.

"Your first official away mission, Cadet. Remember to listen to your superior while you're out there. He tells you to bail, you bail. He runs somewhere, you follow. That understood?"

Icheb nodded eagerly. "Yes, _sir._ Thank you, sir. I will not disappoint you, sir."

"Right. Second thing, you'll need to either crash the dampening field they got around the cargo bay or put transport enhancers in place, so we can get our antigen back. Third, if you get the chance try and sweep the escape pods for DNA. The shuttle bay is close to where the antigen is being stored, but if we need to get you out before then, so be it. However much we all want to make sure that the bastards who left those women behind end up behind a force field somewhere, our priority still lies with our primary mission. Understood?"

Again, both Ayala and Icheb nodded, practically in unison. They would complement each other well, Tom figured – the seasoned warrior with the sixth sense for danger, and the smart technical innovator.

"Jarod, you'll go back to Kalpak, as you suggested. In civvies please; let's not be too obvious here. A quick and dirty hack job into the station's computers should do it. In and out. The trick will be finding the right data base, since I doubt records of criminal activity are being stored on the main computer."

He frowned at his former classmate, not in response to any of the recent tension between them, but in appreciation of the difficult task he was setting him. "You'll be able to come up with an appropriate access point, knowing you. We'll take off as soon as everyone is back; I don't want anyone gone for longer than twenty standard minutes. We can analyze any discrepancies between what's in the logs we find and those from the Rigellian ship en route to our next antigen drop off; should be quite enlightening."

"I'll take Schmidt," Tervellyan offered. "He's quick on his feet."

Tom started to nod his assent, when something gave him pause. What had his XO said earlier? _ Dangerous if there are Syndicate members aboard ... _Jarod and Schmidt might able to handle themselves, but it would be better to include someone who could pass unnoticed under the Syndicate's eyes. Someone who …

He slapped the table lightly with his flat hand and stood up. Chairs, as far as Tom Paris was concerned, were inimical to creative thinking, and pacing always seemed to help advance the development of his more hare-brained schemes … Hadn't he cooked up that whole Arachnia campaign standing up? He made a quick pass around the briefing table, chewing his thumbnail, paused briefly at the observation window, and walked back to his chair. He gripped it with both hands and turned to the EMH, oblivious to the fact that his entire senior staff had been following his progress around the room in slightly perplexed silence.

"Doc, I'd like you to go with him."

Puzzled noises went around the table, punctuated by a barely suppressed "What?" from Tervellyan himself, and ending in the Doctor's own indignant response.

"Mr. … Captain Paris. I have told you and others before, I am a doctor, not a commando. Surely there is someone more suited to sneaking around a crime-infested space station than myself? My skills would be better utilized treating the casualties that will inevitably result from these reckless endeavours."

The EMH caught himself when he noticed Tom's stare turning slightly chilly, and hastily added, "Speaking freely, with permission, _Captain_."

Tom sighed, and briefly considered whether to make an issue of a remark that in anyone's book could only be considered as bordering on subordination. Having that kind of conversation in the confines of Sickbay was one thing; having it in front of the entire senior staff quite another. He and his Chief Medical Officer would need to have a chat, some day. But not now.

"I think we're all aware that this enterprise is not without danger, Doc. And yeah, you've given us that particular line before, whenever we tried to use your talents in new and unusual ways. But I also remember that you always managed to pull it off somehow. And in this case, you're the best man for the job."

He took a deep breath, and explained.

"Two reasons. No, make that three. First, remember when we dealt with those con artists back in the Delta Quadrant, and B'Elanna altered your physical parameters to made you look like one of them? Kalpak is lousy with Narovians and I doubt that one more would get noticed. We need someone in disguise, and you can pull one off even better than Chakotay after cosmetic surgery."

The Doctor seemed ready to vent some more indignant remarks, but Tom cut him off - Captain's prerogative. "It'll only be temporary, don't worry. I doubt you'd look too good with a snout, and hirsute isn't exactly your style. But even more important than your ability to blend in, is the fact that you can use your mobile emitter to download data in a pinch, if Jarod can't do it for some reason. And yes, I know. You're a doctor, not a data PADD. That doesn't mean we can't take advantage of the fact that you can _act _like one from time to time."

Tom ignored the barely suppressed snort coming from Baytart's side of the table, and continued. "But just as important is this: If this place is, as you say, _crime-infested_, there is a chance of a senior Orion Syndicate member being there. And they are often accompanied by one of their tame telepaths, to sniff out potential informants and other dangers. They tend to be Kintzi, which means they have relatively limited range, but within that range they are more acute than any dozen Betazoids. So if you and Jarod should run into one of them …"

He let the thought trail off, while Tervellyan squirmed a little in his seat.

"Fact is, Doc, you or your thoughts won't register. Remember Zimmerman's holographic spying fly that you told us about? What was his name – Leroy? Rodney?"

"Roy." The Doctor's facial expression could have melted the polar ice caps of Andor. First he was being asked to be a commando, then a data storing device, and now … a bug? Tom breezed on, unheeding.

"Right, thanks. Roy the Housefly, also known as Project Trojan Horse." Tom resisted to comment on the intriguingly mixed metaphors; no one could ever accuse the testosterone brigade that ran Starfleet intelligence of thinking before attaching their juvenile monikers to things in the name of secrecy. What was next – a red herring, codenamed Moby Dick? _Focus, Captain Paris._

"We learned about it at the Kirk Centre, in a session on the many bright attempts at tactical advantage that fizzled out because the Federation lacked the underlying technology to make it work reliably."

Jarod nodded slowly; he'd been at the same lecture. "Trojan Horse never got off the ground because if you wanted to do some discreet spying, using a holographic agent, you'd have to put holo-emitters into a place first. And then hope that the stage you set up would be where the interesting stuff will actually happen. Kind of defeats the whole purpose."

"Exactly. But you, Doc, don't have that problem, thanks to our friend Mr. Starling." Tom stared at the EMH triumphantly, daring him to demur. "In short, you're the perfect choice for the job."

The Doc scrunched up his mouth a little sourly, but it did not escape Tom's notice that he appeared to be coming around, and was quite possibly just a little bit chuffed by the idea that he would get to play a featured role in an important mission. Even if he was being compared – however favourably – to a holographic flying pest he personally had taken great delight in squashing.

Even so, the EMH could not quite help himself. "If memory serves, _Captain_, our away missions have a tendency to go awry. You know, a dampening field here, an electro-magnetic storm preventing communications there. What if these … these criminals make it impossible for the away teams to, well, get _away_?"

"You mean, do we have a Plan B? I'll let you know about extraction options before you beam over. But one thing you can be sure of, Doc – on this ship, nobody gets left behind. _Nobody._"

Tom's gaze fixed on his wife. "B'Elanna, how long do you think it will take you to fix up the comm badges and change the Doc's matrix?"

She shrugged. "About an hour each? I suppose you also want me to expand the memory capacity in the mobile emitter, or take something out to make room?"

The EMH bristled a little at that, but truth be told, he found himself rather warming up to the idea of a high-profile away mission. "Well," he mused, "perhaps this little adventure could give rise to a new, low-brow masterpiece from our resident genius of adolescent fiction? Something in the detective vein, perhaps?"

Tom chose to ignore him, except for the message he had wanted to hear: the Doc would play along.

"Whatever it takes, B'Elanna. Doc – thanks for being a sport about this. Jarod, you work out your access issues. Mike, Icheb, I suggest you do a quick run-through on the holodeck. The tactical data base should have a Whorfin class layout, and you can familiarize yourself with the locations of computer access points and the route from the cargo hold to the shuttle bay."

"Aye, sir," came the clipped response from the Chief of Security.

He nodded to the pilot. "Pablo, you and Nicoletti get the engines and helm ready for emergency departure. We may get kicked out of the station's orbit rather forcefully, if they figure out what we're up to. Not to mention we may have someone on our tail if one of the teams gets caught. We're in sensor range of whoever runs the show down there already, I should think, thanks to Lemarr. Set course ready for the Snowflakes, our next scheduled drop off. Whichever of them we can get to under current EM and gravitational conditions."

The Vulcan ops officer took the opportunity of Tom's having to catch his breath to interject her own comments. "In anticipation of further deliveries, we will continue to analyze our transport data for an indication of how the diversion to the Rigellian freighter may have been effected. That task should be made easier once the away team obtains the ship's data signatures."

Tom gave one last look around the table. "Everyone clear about what they need to do?" He took in the universal nods with no small degree of satisfaction, and watched everyone file out of the room, with clear assignments and an overall plan. Maybe, just maybe, he could pull this Captain thing off after all …

He checked the chronometer on his computer screen. He had an hour; enough time to check up on Miral and reassure her that her father hadn't forgotten about her, despite his new job. B'Elanna would be able to spend the evening with her once she was done working her magic on the badges and on the Doc, but he himself would have to stay on the bridge at least until the two away teams returned. Possibly longer, if Kalpak created problems.

And so Tom headed for the nursery, and what he had come to privately call a "munchkin break".

…..

His daughter, when he got there, was absorbed in dismantling a model of the Enterprise that Will Riker and Deanna Troi had given her as a going away present. Even though she was still young enough that home was wherever her parents were, she clearly missed the big ship and the friends she had made there, especially Baby Tommy. It was no surprise, therefore, that the Enterprise had become a favourite toy; in fact, she had had to be dissuaded on several occasions from taking the pointy, hard thing into bed with her. But this was the first time Tom had seen her taking it apart.

"What're you doing, sweetie?" he asked curiously, and kissed her gently on the head.

"Hi Daddy! I'm looking inside."

"And you expect to find … what, exactly?"

He tried, and failed, to keep the amusement from his voice. No matter how tough the going got, his daughter's wide-eyed curiosity and unblemished outlook on the world never failed to brighten his day.

"Green ghost ladies, 'course. Algor says there were some on a ship we found. And now there's one on Voyager, and he says _she_ came from nowhere, like a ghost. His Mommy told him."

Tom's jaw clenched slightly. He'd have to have words with Crewman Cor Zelis about the mouth of babes, and the values of discretion… In the meantime, there was some pre-emptive parenting to be done.

"Yes, someone came onboard, munchkin, and yes, her skin is green – like Chell's skin is blue, and Asil's dark brown - but she's not a ghost. She's a real person, very nice but a bit shy. So we have to be careful not to hurt her feelings by calling her a ghost. She's had a pretty hard time, you see. She ran away from some very bad people and is hiding on Voyager from them now."

Miral's eyes got round, and her mouth formed a little _oh_. "Poor, green lady. Are you and Mommy going to kill the bad people so they can't hurt her anymore?"

Tom squatted down beside her daughter, and took what remained of the toy ship out of her hand. Saucer separation had been completed, and both nacelles and most of the struts removed and scattered on the floor. To his trained eye it looked like the port nacelle could use a stint in Utopia Planitia, after an apparent close encounter with the teeth of a multi-phasic space shark.

"We're mostly going to try and keep her safe, munchkin. Remember - we don't ever kill people unless we have no choice, even evil ones. Besides, first we have to find out who they are, those evil people. That'll take a while. I probably won't be home for dinner tonight again, but Mommy will be there with you. I just came to give you a kiss. Or three."

Miral climbed into Tom's arms willingly, circling his neck with her little arms in the gesture that never ceased to amaze him with the intensity of the feelings it caused to well up inside him. As he buried his face in his daughter's hair, something occurred to him. Lemarr would be alone now in her assigned quarters, doubtless worried and scared of what her future might bring. No one would hold her… Perhaps a brief, non-threatening visit might help her to know that there were people who cared?

And if she didn't want company, at least he'd get a walk with his daughter, and Miral would learn a little about the difference between scurrilous stories and sentient reality, and the power of compassion.

"Would you like to meet the green lady, Miral? She's very nice, but a bit shy. Her name is Lemarr." Miral giggled a little at his attempt at producing the appropriate purr, so he did again a few times, and let her try it before getting up.

"But you can't be too bouncy, okay? She's still a bit scared. Like a kitten that's had a rough time."

Miral nodded solemnly. "Maybe she will like it if I showed her Toby? And the Enterprise?"

Tom smiled at his daughter fondly. "You know, she probably would. I tell you what, you put the Enterprise back together and carry her, and I'll carry Toby. That way we can hold hands when we go to visit her."

"'Kay." Miral reassembled the ship with an efficiency and fluidity of motion that nearly took Tom's breath away. _Her mother's daughter, _he thought with pride – not for the first time.

Together they headed out the door, hand in hand, father and daughter, to meet the girl whose childhood had been stolen in the name of profit and other people's desires.

Perhaps something of what she had lost could be returned to her, in time.


	8. The Best Laid Plans

**Chapter 8 – The Best Laid Plans**

The EMH made absolutely no secret of the fact that he resented the way he looked or felt as a Narovian, short of being outright species-ist in his rants.

"That … that primitive _snout_ is impeding proper breathing functions," he huffed, as B'Elanna continued to make adjustments to his mobile emitter.

She turned to him, clearly non-plussed, her miniature hypo-spanner hovering in mid-air. "You actually_ breathe_?" she asked. "That's news to me. I thought…"

He glared at her. "In a manner of speaking, I do. My sensory subroutines simulate inhalation and exhalation; of course no oxygen passes into my lung matrix, that is something I am happy to leave to you organics. But in order for me to _look_ as if I were breathing, I have to rely on certain physical parameters. These … puncture holes that pass for nostrils among the Narovians function nothing _like_ the human nose, and I'm afraid your tinkering so far has been purely cosmetic, without _takimg_ the construction of my airways into account. All this to say won't be able to simulate proper respiration with that … that _thing_ on my face."

B'Elanna rolled her eyes. "You look perfectly … Narovian to me, and for what it's worth, you do look like you're breathing like one of them. Look, Doc, I programmed the full Narovian physiology, right from your medical data base into both Sickbay's holoprogram and your mobile emitter. It's just not what you're used to. You're a complete specimen, fully functional in all respects. Including if you were to meet a willing Narovian female and had the time and the inclination. Since you always seem to place such emphasis on your sex life, however _theoretical_ it may be."

His icy glare could have turned the Chief Engineer's smirking lips into a puddle of liquid nitrogen, had she bothered to look up. Instead, she continued blithely.

"So, if you don't feel comfortable, it isn't because there's something missing, but because it's all in your head. I mean, in your cerebral subroutines. Unless you think there's something wrong with those, too?"

B'Elanna straightened up from the bench to the sounds of the Doc muttering imprecations about engineers, and their constitutional inability to appreciate the difference between a wall panel and complex physiology. She ignored him with a roll of her eyes.

"There. All done. I've temporarily increased the capacity of your mobile emitter to download all data from Kalpak station, with the exception of operating and life support systems. But we can't leave the enhancement in place too long or it will overload your other systems."

"That's a relief," he countered acidly. "I was afraid you'd want me to run your warp engines for you next."

"Not a chance, Doc. You'd never be able to manage the right … _pulse_. Too much Verdi, not enough Marley."

She was spared another retort when the door to Sickbay slid open to admit the First Officer. Dressed in dark brown slacks, a pale blue shirt and scruffy leather vest, and with artificially stimulated black facial hair now shadowing his face into a bluish tint, Jarod Tervellyan looked every bit the freighter crewman he would pretend to be.

"Where's your comm badge, Commander?" the Doc asked. Jarod lifted his vest, to show where it was clipped underneath.

"There's no rule it has to be visibly attached to the outermost piece of clothing," he said simply. "May as well tattoo the word _Starfleet _on your forehead. I recommend you do the same thing with your mobile emitter, Doc, namely cover it up a little. You _can_ wear regular clothing, can't you?"

The EMH looked puzzled. "I suppose so," he said slowly. "To tell you the truth, I never thought about it before. I've always changed my physical parameters to alter my appearance; I've never put on clothing meant for organics."

"Doesn't that make it too easy to knock that emitter off your sleeve?"

Both B'Elanna and the EMH stared at the First Officer as if he had just metamorphosed into a Pah wraith. Tervellyan shook his head. His thoughts were clearly visible to anyone who cared to look: _Some things on this ship really could use a bit of fresh thinking. _

They spent the next few minutes in deep technical conversation, with a recovered B'Elanna explaining to the XO how to use the mobile emitter as a download device in the event his tricorder failed him. Finally, Tervellyan nodded decisively.

"Well, I think we're ready. Ayala and Icheb will be in the transporter room I a few minutes, waiting for us. We're going in in parallel. You good to go, Doc?"

Not awaiting an answer, he strode out of Sickbay, leaving the EMH to scramble after him, and B'Elanna unable to wish either of them good luck.

…..

The tinkle of the transporter had barely left Icheb's skin when he turned on his heels to orient himself. They were in the Rigellian's cargo bay, where illumination was at ten percent at best; apparently, its owners saw no need to waste energy unless someone was actually working there. Several stacks of barrels containing the antigen solution loomed in the corner like small, dark mountains, with the metal rims of the individual containers giving off only the occasional dull glint.

After waiting for a couple of seconds to ensure that they had not set off any intruder alerts – not standard equipment on a freighter, but you never knew - Ayala gestured with his drawn phaser: The wall panels. Icheb nodded his understanding. Priority One was to take down the dampening field in the cargo bay, to enable transport of the antigen back to Voyager.Icheb headed for the nearest panel, as sure-footed as only a former Borg drone with residual ocular enhancements could be in the near-darkness.

The big Lieutenant ran his tricorder over the stack of containers and, having verified that they were what he was looking for, nodded to himself and holstered it again. He began to affix transporter tags, one for each stack, with his left hand, without relinquishing the phaser he was holding in his right.

Icheb lifted the panel off the wall with the aid of a hypospanner and entered a few commands. With a satisfied grin he nodded to Ayala, who tapped his comm badge and hissed a one-word command: _Now. _The barrels started to disappear as soon as he could tag them.

Icheb, for his part, worked to establish a link between the ship's computer and the tricorder he had brought for downloading purposes. Fingers flying, he cursed softly - a habit he had picked up from his roommate at the Academy, a volatile but harmless aspiring engineer from one of the rougher colonies. He clearly would have to bypass a protocol blocking access to the main computer from auxiliary outlets; valuable minutes would be lost.

Icheb's computer was finally signaling an actual data flow had commenced, and Ayala was about three-quarters done, when the bay was suddenly flooded in light and alarm klaxons started blaring.

"Shit," Ayala snarled. "They made your hack job. Let's get out of here."

Both men activated their site-to-site transports for beam-out, waiting for the familiar tingle to wash over their skin. Nothing happened. They exchanged quick, concerned looks.

"They must have reestablished the dampening fields, via central controls," Icheb announced unnecessarily, his clear young voice conveying a mixture of indignation and barely suppressed panic.

Ayala stood still for a split second, his dark eyes darting around the room, looking for all the world like a caged animal searching for the small crack of sunlight that might signal freedom. He threw the remaining few transport tags onto the barrels and turned on his heel.

"The escape pods," he snarled and headed for the door, phaser at the ready, not waiting to see whether Icheb would follow him. That order, he figured, had been given already - by the Captain himself.

Icheb snapped his tricorder shut and holstered it quickly; he didn't think he had completed the download but he also knew what he had to do. He was a trained Starfleet officer now … well, not quite yet, but almost. He pulled out his own phaser and followed Ayala to the exit, swallowing down – what had the Doc called them, the butterflies? – in his stomach at the thought of what might be his exchange of hostilities in the line of duty.

Ayala pressed his big form against the wall beside the exit door, tapped the wall panel and waited until it had opened. He stuck his head carefully into the corridor, only to retract it when phaser fire struck the frame.

"Shit," he said again, in a matter-of-fact tone that would have impressed his young companion had he not been focusing on other matters. Like the Security Chief's decisive wave of his phaser, the slight curving action indicating that Icheb was to attempt to sortie to the left, in the direction of the shuttle bay, ready to fire. A repeat pointing of the index finger in the same direction conveyed the distinct message that he was to _go, go, go. _

Ayala tapped his own chest and repeated his wrist movement towards the right; he would cover that part of the corridor where the phaser blast had come from.

"My mark. Two – three – one. _NOW."_

Ayala hurled himself out the door and somersaulted onto the floor, reducing his target even as he brought his weapon up and fired stun blasts in rapid succession at the two Rigellians who were partly seeking cover behind a turn in the corridor. One of them shrieked as his weapon clattered onto the floor before his own collapse.

The other man continued to fire at Ayala, who had regained his footing and was now retreating backwards after Icheb, who was headed for the shuttle bay, and their only opportunity at escape. The Rigellian continued to fire his own phaser, less than effectively from behind his cover position; sparks flew as his shots glanced off ceiling panels and the smell of fried wiring permeated the corridor. Ayala did not need to see the blackening metal to know that the man's weapon was set on maximum.

Icheb had turned the next corridor, and it was only his youthful reflexes that caused him to jump aside as he, too, was met with phaser fire. Everything seemed to slow down as he lifted his weapon, his hand steady, his focus on his green-skinned attacker as clear as if he had painted the man's chest with a targeting laser. He squeezed the trigger and watched the man crumble to the floor, a part of his brain surprisingly able to marvel at the absence of any particular feeling as he did so.

Was he turning back into a drone…?

With the apparently lone attacker in front of him dispatched, Icheb's attention was diverted back behind him, where a sudden sharply voiced command caused the half-hidden Rigellian to jump into the center of the corridor where, free of any obstacle but also of cover, he trained his phaser on Mike Ayala. And fired.

The Lieutenant hissed a sharp curse in a language Icheb vaguely identified as colonial Spanish, similar to what he had frequently heard coming from the Chief Engineer while he was assisting her in the Delta Quadrant. Ayala clutched his right side, his now-useless phaser dangling from his hand. His leg buckled and as he went down, Icheb fired over his head at the Rigellian. The man collapsed without a sound; there was no sign as yet of whoever had ordered him to engage in what could have been a suicide mission, had the Starfleet officers' weapons been on the same setting as their adversaries'.

_Nobody gets left behind. _

Icheb wasn't sure whether the overriding voice that was reverberating in his mind was the Captain's, Starfleet combat training, or a residual Borg salvage order; it would be heeded regardless of its source. Phaser still trained on the corridor ahead, he bent down and pulled Ayala up into a half crouch, supporting him with his left arm.

"Come on, Lieutenant, we have to go," he said urgently, the simplicity of the words sounding vaguely ridiculous to his own ears. Ayala grunted and got up on his feet, swaying but obviously still able to move, if only by force of will and years of training. Icheb forced himself to look away from the blackened hole in Ayala's uniform, and the red and sticky mass that was beginning to soak through it.

"Let's go," he said again, when a sudden movement at the end of the corridor caught his attention. He lifted his phaser and fired, even as Ayala managed to switch his own weapon into his other hand and do the same. Neither would be able to say afterwards whose shot had been successful, but it didn't really matter in the end.

Half-carrying a cursing and grunting Ayala, thankful for the extra strength bestowed on him by what remained of Borg technology in his body and his blood, Icheb moved the two of them towards where their holodeck exercise had told him the shuttle bay would be.

Four pods, metal dull with age but otherwise unharmed, were lined up side by side in the bay. Icheb headed for the one closest to the airlock, whose forcefield sparked slightly in the dark. He heaved Ayala into the pod and clambered in behind him, checking to see if anyone had followed them in. Not yet.

Icheb slammed the hatch shut and thanked the many hours of piloting-with-your-guts training he had had on the Delta Flyer with then-Lieutenant Paris, rather than the standard sessions at the Academy. He entered the necessary commands for immediate launch even before sitting down, relying on the escape pod to do the rest.

He hissed a gratified _yess _when the lumbering pod started to move towards the airlock. The pod started to rock slightly due to phaser fire now coming from inside the shuttle bay, but Icheb focused fully on moving the small vessel through the forcefield curtain and out into space. Escape pods, even those built for mere freighters, by their very nature were designed to withstand considerable external abuse, and he was confident that it would survive whatever these so-called freighter crewmembers could dole out with their hand-held weapons.

At least a freighter wouldn't come equipped with offensive weapons arrays, and if it did, would be unlikely to be able to use them effectively while docked.

The escape pod having cleared the ship, Icheb tapped his comm badge and tried to force his voice into as calm a tone as he could muster while still gulping for air from his recent exertions. He looked around at Ayala, who had slid down on the floor and was leaning against a console now, breathing shallowly but giving his young crewmate a weak thumbs up.

"Away Team One to Voyager and Captain Paris, this is Cadet Icheb. Our transporters were disabled and we were forced to steal one of those escape pods we were supposed to look at. Lieutenant Ayala is injured pretty badly. He will be fine, I think, but he should be transported to Sickbay as soon as we are clear of the dampening field. Lock onto me as well just in case, but it occurs to me that it would be desirable if I could bring the pod to Voyager, since we ran out of time to examine it onboard the freighter. So I think I should try and do that, sir. Instead of being transported aboard, I mean, sir."

Back on Voyager's bridge, Tom Paris breathed a silent sigh of relief, even as he smiled a little at Icheb's less-than-clipped sit rep.

"Paris here. Understood, Cadet. You've done well, very well. Yes, do try to recover the escape pod for examination. I'll head down in Sickbay to help with Lieutenant Ayala, since the Doc isn't here. Paris out."

He tapped the console for internal comms. "Sickbay, prepare for incoming casualty. I'll be joining you. Pablo, tractor the pod in as soon as you can; it should be in range shortly."

Tom stood with his fingers curled around the back of the Captain's chair and pulled his lower lip between his teeth. _One down, one to go._

…..

Jarod Tervellyan and the Doc materialized in a deserted corridor of Kalpak station, near the waste disposal module. The EMH found himself continuously having to resist the temptation to run his fingers over the ridges on his cheekbones, to feel the flattened nasal bone and slit nostrils. He restricted himself instead to periodically stroking the leather jacket he had borrowed from Mr. … Captain Paris, idly wondering why he had never considered non-holographic clothing before. The weight it settled on his holographic matrix felt … no, that wasn't the right word … made movement a little odd, but not unpleasantly so - even if he'd had to roll back the sleeves a little to make the thing fit.

Approaching footsteps broke him out of his reverie, and he barely managed to gather his wits sufficiently to emulate the Commander, who nodded curtly but politely at the two Narovian maintenance men who came striding purposefully towards, then past, them, hyperspanners in hand and toolboxes slung over their shoulders.

"Act like you belong here, and people will assume you do," Tervellyan advised.

"Right. I will pretend to be an under-educated … what does Mr. Paris call them? Grease monkey?"

"Pretend to be the owner of a Class Four private yacht, for all I care," Tervellyan snapped. "Just stop fidgeting and looking around as if every rivet contains a miniature rendition of the _Enigma Tales_ of Shoggoth, or something else that needs to be absorbed, digested and analyzed to death. Pretend you don't give a shit, for whatever reason suits your fancy, and you'll be fine."

It was clear that the Commander was not in a particularly patient mood. In fact, the Doctor was fairly confident that if he could surreptitiously run his tricorder over him, the diagnosis would be a case of acute vasoconstriction due to excessive adrenaline. He did not need instruments of any kind, however, to be aware of Tervellyan's accelerated breathing. In fact, now that he thought about it, he could almost have sworn the XO was suffering from acute anxiety.

What the EMH was less confident about was whether his partner had any real idea of where they were, or should be, headed.

"You do have a plan beyond telling me how to behave, don't you, Commander?" he asked, in a voice laced with a judicious amount of acid.

Tervellyan glared at him. "We are heading for an access points from which we should be able to download the station's logs and main operational databases," he said in a low voice. "But I suppose you were too busy keeping your head up your own ass to listen to the Captain's orders?"

Slightly taken aback by the rather personal and scathing nature of the comeback – and blissfully unaware as to his own possible role in provoking it - the Doctor frowned in silence, finding himself irrationally nostalgic for one of the sarcastic remarks that might have emanated from Tom Paris in similar circumstances. He gave a little holographic sigh, tried to ascribe the Commander's foul mood to nerves, and scrambled to keep up with his energetic, angry stride.

They turned a corner, and Tervellyan came to a sudden stop. "Here," he said, all business now. "That wall panel. According to our schematic, it leads to a Jeffries tube that in turn connects to the one that runs up to the auxiliary back-up node for the main operations system. With any luck, no one is scheduled to do any systems diagnostics right now, and we can just patch the data stream through to Voyager."

He loosened the panel and motioned the Doctor to follow him.

"With any luck …?" the Doc muttered to himself as he climbed into the wall opening, behind the XO, idly wondering why they had not beamed straight to their destination. Jeffries tubes were not his favourite place.

…..

Once Tom Paris reached Sickbay, everything that had been on his mind receded momentarily at the sight of Mike Ayala, lying unconscious on one of the biobeds. Nurse Tval had already removed the charred uniform remnants from the Lieutenant's side and sterilized the area where he had been burnt by the Rigellian's phaser.

Luckily, a quick examination confirmed that the wound was not a critical one, and Tom was able to carry out the few internal sutures required without recourse to the surgical arch. A few minutes of work, and his breath hissed out in relief as Ayala stirred and opened his eyes with a barely suppressed curse.

"I think you're gonna be okay, Mike," Tom said, trying to project as much confidence a he could muster while closing up the injuries of an officer who had been carrying out _his_ orders. _Something to be shelved for later. _

"A few rounds with a dermal regenerator, and you'll be as good as new."

Ayala nodded his acknowledgement of the somewhat imprecise prognosis, and grimaced a little as Tval injected him with a hypospray.

"Shit, I hate meds," he groused, even as the relief from pain he had refused to acknowledge began to relax his features. "Witchcraft for sissies, if you ask me." Then he focused on Tom, his eyes intent.

"The kid, Icheb," he said. "Saved the mission when I got hit. He's the real deal, Tom … sorry, _Captain_. Should try and keep him on the ship."

Tom nodded. "Planning on it. But your report can wait, Mike. I think I better get back to the bridge, now that I'm sure you'll be okay. Lots of stuff to do, and we haven't heard from the other team yet. Nurse Tval can start dermal regeneration."

"I can do this," a soft voice came from the entrance to Sickbay. All three officers turned to see Lemarr, barely inside the room, her back pressed against the wall as if unsure of her welcome – or her own courage.

"Lemarr," Tom said, hiding his surprise. He had suggested when he had visited her with Miral that she might wish to spend time with Tval, with whom she appeared to have built something of a rapport, but he had not really expected her to actually act on the idea. At least not that soon. Yet, here she was, her unwavering emerald eyes now firmly fixed on Ayala, the price in courage that she had paid for the journey to Sickbay barely audible in her voice.

"I can help heal," she said simply. "I have used this device many times. And I wish to pay this man back for what I took from him. Please."

Tom flinched, as his reluctant mind glossed over just how the young Orion might have acquired her expertise with the dermal regenerator. He bit back a soft curse. But the revulsion he felt was quickly displaced by something else: admiration, and respect.

Here was a woman, barely more than a girl, really, who for years had been used by others for their pleasure, for profit, or for whatever sensation of … power those of a certain mindset might derive from bending another being to their will. But Lemarr Valon, taken so many times, would not take in return. Having seized her chance at freedom on Mike Ayala's back, she was determined to repay him, as best she could, for whatever she felt she owed him.

She would not be one of _them_. She would choose to be different.

Tom understood, so very clearly. Wordlessly, he handed her the regenerator.

"I think you're in good hands, Mike," he said simply. "Nurse Tval and Lemarr will make sure you get fixed up. I'll see you later. And I'll tell Icheb you commended him."

He gave an encouraging nod to Tval, which the Betazoid nurse returned in kind. She would do her best to allow Lemarr to feel useful. To support her choice.

…..

When Tom emerged from the turbolift that delivered him back on the bridge, he found his Ops Officer ready to pounce on his presence. It was not really a pounce, of course; Asil was far too much a pure-blood Vulcan for that to be an option. But it was clear that she had been waiting for his return; her eyes were on him almost before he entered, without any indication that she had shifted them from anywhere else.

"Captain, may I speak with you in your ready room?"

Tom nodded once and kept walking, knowing Asil would follow him.

Even though he had steeled himself for something less than good news, she still managed to surprise him. "Computer, erect security sound barrier. Asil Pi Delta Nine Seven." More than he felt puzzlement at the unexpected command, Tom was struck once more how much she sounded like her father when she spat out codes like that. As the force field that would muffle all sound waves and reverberations shimmered up and around them, he turned to her in a silence of his very own, awaiting the explanation he knew would come.

"Sir, Crewman Zelis and Ensign Murphy have been working on the transporter signal, as we discussed. They discovered that there was an alternative signal embedded in the coordinates, one that activated as soon as demolecularization was initiated at our end. The destination coordinates are consistent with a ship in orbit around Nemoth II."

"Glad you confirmed that. But we suspected as much already, Asil – so why the secrecy?"

Asil hesitated momentarily, in a most un-Vulcan manner, before straightening her shoulders to deliver the news she knew would come as a blow to her Captain.

"I regret to inform you, Captain Paris, that an examination of the findings that were presented to me have led me to the incontrovertible conclusion that the alterations to the transport coordinates were made from onboard this ship."

Tom stared at his Ops Officer, his mouth opening slightly as if he was making to say something, then closing again. He felt the shock of her statement as something physical, deep in his gut. _So this is how Janeway felt, when Tuvok discovered that someone was sending messages to the Kazon._

But then it struck him that, no, this was different. His was not Janeway's motley crew, thrown together by circumstance, with a few psychopathic wild cards and habitual traitors tossed into the mix. His was a crew of handpicked professional Starfleet officers, all of whom – especially the former Maquis among them - had proven themselves in the line of duty. Even the most recent Academy graduates onboard came with a pedigree of references that he himself would not have been able to produce a mere nine years ago, when he was sitting in the Federal Penal Settlement at Auckland with a criminal conviction, a court martial and a forced resignation from Starfleet under his belt.

Tom Paris had turned a corner in his life, one that had led straight to the four pips that now adorned his collar; how hard was it to believe that someone might have done likewise, but headed in the opposite direction?

Tom swallowed the bile that threatened to rise in his throat. Life was full of opportunities, whether they came as the result of hard work, as unexpected gifts, or as unwelcome burdens. Choices, made or denied. Chances, seized or squandered. What could have made a Starfleet Officer choose an organization that thrived on misery and death, all in the name of profit?

At a guess, the answer lay in that last question. Profit. Not a motive that had ever held any sway over him personally – even in his darkest moments, when he was the farthest removed from the humanitarian ideals of Starfleet. How could one be part of the one, but seduced by the other?

He shook off what he knew to be useless indignation, thoughts to be explored later and by better analysts than himself. In the meantime, Asil expected instructions; she would have them. Luckily – or not – tracking traitors was an area in which he did have some hard-won expertise.

"If we do have an agent for the Syndicate onboard, it would stand to reason that he or she has been communicating with their contacts, in addition to engineering the diversion of the antigen. When we were in the Delta Quadrant, we had a spy who used to conceal illicit transmissions by sending them out through the power grid; the messages were encoded in the waste energy from the propulsion systems."

A brief smile ghosted across his face as the odd symmetry of this distant memory struck him. "In fact, your father discovered them. I recommend you run a diagnostic of the last, oh, ninety-six or so hours' worth of all our comms and energy emissions and look for any unexplained divergences."

"Aye sir," Asil replied simply. "I assume that I will have to carry out the task by myself, since we cannot, at this time, be certain that other members of the crew are not implicated."

Tom flashed a quick grin that almost, but not quite, touched his eyes. "I think you can probably safely enlist the Chief Engineer's help; she'll have an idea what to look for, too. I happen to know where she's been for pretty well every day of the last nine years, and doubt that she's had much of an opportunity to join an organized crime cartel."

"Thank you for that suggestion, Captain. I will contact Lieutenant Commander Torres at once." She called out her security code and the force field - which Tom had surreptitiously dubbed the _cone of silence_ when he had been introduced to the new technology at the Kirk Centre - dissolved like a burning shroud.

Tom nodded his dismissal and Asil turned on her heel and left the ready room, unaware of his eyes following her. He once again mentally thanked Tuvok for suggesting that his daughter might have a place on Voyager's crew; Vulcans might be lacking a certain warmth and fuzziness, but there was no one more reliable when you needed somebody to have your back.

…..

The crawl through the bowels of Kalpak station was much longer than the Doctor expected, even though the map that had been entered into Tervellyan's tricorder ensured that the away team would not make any unnecessary turns. At least they had not encountered any more station personnel – something the EMH considered to be a distinct bonus.

Finally, they came to a panel that seemed to be what the Commander had been looking for. He checked their location against the station's map on his tricorder, before running the instrument over the panel to confirm that the room behind it was free of biosigns.

"Does your tricorder show whether there are any booby-traps?" the Doc demanded, even as Tervellyan was opening the panel. The Commander ignored him, and scanned the room with narrowed eyes before motioning the Doctor to follow him inside.

"Here," he said, pointing at a console sitting on what was obviously a frequently used desk, judging by a clutter of PADDs beside the console. The small-radius dampening field emitter beside the desk explained why any attempt to beam directly into the quarters would have been doomed to failure. A favourite status symbol among senior executives, the gadget was not popular with law enforcement for obvious reasons; it certainly was not surprising to the EMH that an official of this station might want one for his office. Still …

The Doctor stepped into the room, frowning. "These are somebody's private quarters, not a command centre. Are you certain, Commander …"

"Yes, they are. And yes, I am. Based on the station schematic, this suite belongs to one of the station's senior officials. Any senior official I know, in Starfleet or elsewhere, is tethered to his work, even in their quarters. And if there are subterranean things going on, we're more likely to find useful records in a personal system, than at a work station that's accessible to everyone from the janitor on up."

"But what if this is not the senior official who is involved in those _subterranean things_? How would you know that we are in the right place?"

Again, the Commander chose to ignore the slightly petulant question. "Doctor, if you please …? We don't have much time here. It's alpha shift time and the occupant _should_ be off doing whatever they do around here to keep the place running. But we can't count on him keeping regular working hours. So get over here, and we'll start the download."

The EMH huffed a little at the evident impatience in Tervellyan's tone, and took the measure of the room before complying. It was sufficiently well furnished, but lacked any of the personal touches one might expect from someone on long-term assignment. In fact, it was beyond tidy. The only sign that someone actually lived here, apart from those PADDs, was a hairbrush on one of the credenzas.

"Didn't you say – or assume - the occupant was male?" the EMH asked as he crossed the floor.

"Yes, why?"

Silently, the Doctor pointed to the hairbrush. Tervellyan snorted. "What – just because you don't need one, means that other guys don't? I have news for you, Doc. Some of us do, me included. Now can you please take off that jacket so I can get at your mobile emitter?"

The Doctor glowered, but slipped off the jacket as he had been asked. To his surprise, he missed the … solid feel of the piece of clothing, even as he wondered again what on Earth might have caused Tom Paris to burn a hole into its pocket, and then not to have it fixed. Well, the latter oversight was probably just his former assistant's general laissez-faire attitude to life.

He winced reflexively as Tervellyan reached for his emitter. "What?" the Commander asked again. "I'm reliably advised that you won't go off-line when I take it off."

"N-n-no," the Doc, resenting the fact that he was caught stammering, as if he was nervous about what was about to happen. Well, fine, he _was_ nervous. "My matrix retains its integrity within a few meters of the emitter, provided it is active."

"Okay then, so relax." Tervellyan was already focused on punching commands into the console on the desk, and removed a small device from his pocket. He attached it to the console and held the emitter over it, then gave a grunt of satisfaction as the latter started humming with the rapid data stream it was receiving. B'Elanna Torres could be a pain sometimes, but she sure knew her trade.

"Weren't you supposed to download the data to Voyager first, Commander?" the Doctor couldn't resist asking. "I believe I was supposed to function merely as your … how did Mr. Paris put it so delicately … your _insurance policy_?"

"That's right, Doc, and I'd like to have you in my back pocket before I risk setting off all sorts of alarm bells with a full on data transfer," Tervellyan said, without looking up. "Don't worry, I'm speaking figuratively."

He checked the console and the emitter to satisfy himself that the download was complete. "Done. Here, Doc, take the emitter back. Preserve the data, above all. You get yourself back into the tube and start heading back towards where you won't arouse suspicions; I'll try and initiate the data transfer to Voyager. And just in case, you do remember Plan B, don't you?"

Gritting his teeth slightly, the EMH nodded. "Of course I do_. _Although I fervently hope that it will not come to that. But aren't we supposed to stay together?"

Tervellyan gave a slightly impatient sigh. "I can crawl through that tube at a far greater clip than you can with those odd knees of yours, Doc. I'll catch up with you in a few moments. Now _go_, and that's an order! "

The EMH huffed a little as he attached the emitter back to his uniform sleeve and pulled the leather jacket back on over top of it. For good measure, he grabbed a few of the PADDs and stuck them into the pockets, which were surprisingly roomy.

As he entered the tube, he heard Tervellyan curse softly.

"Shit. The system is rigged not to permit transmittals off station. Looks like you're the only game in town, Doc. Plus we may well have set off an alarm. Let's get out of here while we can. _Go!_"

He was just about to turn and follow the Doctor, when the outside door to the cabin hissed open. He froze in place, realizing that if he headed towards the other room, he would give away the Doc's presence.

Tervellyan's breath caught in his throat, but his immediate impulse - to go for his weapon - was stilled when he saw whom the door had admitted: an Orion female, somewhat older than the dancers and the Dabo girls he had seen on the station, but dressed similarly, in a flowing white dress that revealed the soft swell of a pair of ripe viridian breasts.

There could be only one reason she would be in these quarters.

"Don't be afraid," Tervellyan rasped. "I won't harm you. You can come with me, back to my ship, where you'll be safe."

A small smile played around the woman's luscious mouth as she reached languidly into a fold in her dress.

"Who's afraid?" she purred, and pulled out a phaser.


	9. Doctor, Spy

**Chapter 9 – Doctor, Spy**

The Doctor froze when he heard the words, spoken in an accent that reminded him of Lemarr, even though the tone was unlike anything he had heard coming from the Orion fugitive.

_Who's afraid? _

Not a question – more a taunt, a threat, like the hiss of a cobra rising to strike.

He peeked through the opening of the tube. What he saw made his eyes go wide. The silhouette of a woman in a flowing dress, her hand raised at the Commander's chest. The fact that he had been correct about the likely owner of the hair brush gave him no satisfaction, at the sight of her hand which, although he could not see it behind Tervellyan's body, very clearly held a phaser. Tervellyan's arms were raised, fingers slightly splayed, in the universal gesture of surrender.

The Doctor's emergency subroutines kicked in with a vengeance, and he suppressed the shiver that might have paralyzed him further. He had no clear shot with his own phaser, and he knew he could not make a sound or the Commander would likely be dead.

His instincts shouted at him to assist, defend, protect. What was the unwritten Voyager rule, never broken - except when a superior officer gave an express order?

_Nobody gets left behind._

Tervellyan's own orders had been clear: _Head back to where you won't arouse suspicions. Preserve the data, above all._

The Doc shook his head and crawled further up the tube, around the nearest corner, where he could not be seen from the quarters they had just broken into. The panel was still open, and the cabin's occupants would know how Tervellyan had gotten in. But if they scanned the tube, they would find no other bio signs. In the meantime, the EMH could remain unseen, listen, and perhaps even have a few moments to think about what to do next.

He heard another voice, male this time, followed by a slight buzz that his acute hearing identified as a tricorder. "Nothing there. I can't feel another presence. He was alone, like he says," the voice confirmed.

There were advantages to sending a hologram on a spying mission, he had to admit. _Score one for Project Trojan Horse, _the Doc admitted, and allowed himself a brief pang of regret at the untimely passing – at his own holographic hand - of Roy the Housefly.

"Let's keep him alive, for now," the Orion voice said. "I have some questions for our … friend."

The Doc let out a holographic breath. There was a bit of time; he could go for reinforcement rather than attempt to mount a rescue mission on his own. Then again, if this was the Syndicate, just what methods might they employ to ask their questions …? He shook his head, to try and remove such thoughts from his subroutines for the time being. He needed to focus on going somewhere where it would be safe to comm Voyager, and to request immediate beam-out for them both.

The Doctor headed up the tube, thanking his programming that he had perfect recall of the direction from which they had come. After he had put what he thought was a safe auditory distance between his own location and the ill-fated quarters, he tapped his comm badge.

"EMH to Voyager."

And met with silence.

"EMH to Captain Paris. Come in, please. Request immediate transport for myself and Commander Tervellyan. You will need to lock onto his biosigns as his communicator is likely compromised. Hello? Hello?"

He clenched his jaw in frustration when it became obvious that he would not get a response. Was it the Jeffries tubes that caused the disruption? Unlikely; he had always been able to use communications inside them on Voyager. Maybe the station's owners had set up a dampening field? That was more likely – and who knew what the other away team had been doing; maybe both of them had been discovered, and this was part of a hostile response …

But surely the situation was not dire enough for Tom Paris' so-called _Plan B_?

If they wanted him to be a Trojan Horse, like that pesky house fly of Zimmermann's, he might as well act like one and see if he could circumvent whatever barriers the Syndicate might throw up.

…..

"Captain, both the Commander's and the Doctor's communicators have gone off-line."

Tom spat out a curse. He asked the word he did not want to. "Destroyed?"

Asil shook her head. "Unconfirmed; I believe someone on the station has initiated a complete communications black-out. All signals are being reflected, including a hail to central station command I just attempted. It would be logical to assume that the blackout may be a reaction to the away team's attempts to, as you put it, _hack into_ the station's database. It does not mean that the team itself has been discovered, or seized."

_Like hell it didn't. _ Any number of scenarios raced through Tom's head, each worse than the one before. And each the direct consequence of his decision to send them into danger…

"Can you still read biosigns? A holographic signature?"

Asil punched in a few commands, while Baytart and Schmidt, who was manning Tactical in Ayala's absence, exchanged concerned glances.

"I may have located what could be the Commander's bio signs, Captain, and a holographic pattern that could be the EMH. The former is stationary, while the latter is moving away."

"Do you have enough to get a transporter lock?"

"Negative, sir. The blackout will not permit it. We have some limited eyes in, as far as tracking the Commander's bio signs and the EMH's signature are concerned, but we cannot contact them or pull them out. The required signal strength is too great, and is getting caught up in the station's defensive grid. It is amazingly well-equipped for a commercial station, sir."

Tom filed that last remark, and started to chew his lower lip. If the team had been forced to split up, something had to have gone seriously wrong.

"I assume there's been no data transmission into our computer?"

He did not wait for the expected headshake before muttering a curse. He turned to Baytart and Schmidt. "Have Coulthard and Nicoletti meet me in Shuttle Bay Two. Arno, you're with me. We're taking the Flyer; extraction protocol."

Tom turned to Asil. "You have the bridge, Lieutenant. Make sure your team continues with the analysis of the data Icheb and Ayala managed to bring back."

He took a deep breath and was halfway to the turbolift before his comm badge, chirped, on a closed line.

"Bring them back, Tom. And don't be too much of a hero. Torres out."

…..

The Doctor tried his communicator after every turn in the Jeffries tube, to no avail. Finally, he arrived at the panel where he and Tervellyan had entered. As he had seen the Commander do, he scanned for bio signs through the closed panel.

"No organics. Thanks for small mercies," he muttered to himself as he operated the lever. He stuck his head out and, seeing no one, climbed out, mentally cursing the unfamiliar bend of the Narovian knee. It took him longer than expected, and focused as he was on the operation of his extremities, he was not prepared for the voice that accosted him.

"Hey you," came the sharp challenge, causing him to bang his head on the metal frame. The EMH yelped a little – in surprise rather than pain, since he felt the former, but not the latter – and found himself confronted by a large 'fellow' Narovian. Not the brightest light, the Doctor determined instantly, if one could judge by the open-mouthed manner in which the man chewed some vile local botanical, displaying blue-stained, decaying teeth.

"Whatcher you doin' in the tube, buster? No maintenance call scheduled, far'n I know?"

The Doc gathered his wits. "It's the _unscheduled_ maintenance calls that cause all the trouble, as I'm sure you know," he retorted. "There was a report of the sonic shower malfunctioning in one of the quarters."

"Sonic showers? Again? Whoever built this sucker of a station sure'n hell skimped on the connectors. _And _anything else. Never seen such shitty workmanship in me life. Only place they spent real money on is shields and scrambling devices - it's a wonder the place don't come apart at the rivets." He stopped for a moment, and scratched his sizeable gut.

"Well, at least it'll keep the likes of me'n'you in Kala leaves, eh." He lumbered down the hall without further questions – including the one the Doctor had been dreading as soon as his convenient excuse had left his lips, namely just where the supposed maintenance was hiding his toolkit. The EMH emitted a holographic sigh of relief.

A quick look at the wall schematic showed him that he was but one floor up from the infamous bar; figuring that he should be able to find a public comms facility on that level, the Doctor pulled his shoulders a little straighter and headed for a turbolift.

The promenade was busy, but not excessively so. He walked slowly, looking around as if he had just newly arrived and was taking the lay of the land, all the while searching for a comm station.

As he came closer to the bar and foot traffic picked up, the Doctor was able to snatches of conversation that not only provided rather unwelcome news, but convinced him of the futility of his current endeavour:

"… tried to comm my wife on Arren. She's having a baby and I promised to comm her every day, but …"

"Sodding incompetence. Can't even get the ship, and it's bloody _docked_ here. Only thing that works on this puke hole of a station is the women."

Communications apparently were off line throughout Kalpak. A reaction to Tervellyan's attempt to transmit the station's database to Voyager? Or had the owners detected the fact that a transfer of the data had already taken place? Did it matter which? Either way, Voyager's crew would have noticed that the away team had been cut off, and drawn certain conclusions.

But in the meantime, the XO was in the hands of a hostile alien who, more likely than not, belonged to a notorious criminal gang and he himself was the only person who knew where he was being kept. Luckily, no one seemed to be suspecting that Tervellyan had had company, or would know whom to look for; the Doctor barely remembered his current physical parameters himself.

That said, being a stranger alone on a space station full of potential criminals – or traders, which based on the EMH's experiences in the Delta Quadrant, was almost the same thing – was not ideal. What he needed was allies.

The only person who came to mind was Tervellyan's acquaintance. He was stuck on the station thanks to the quarantine, the XO had said; it stood to reason that he was still here. Duranium trader, apparently. The barkeeper might know him, remember the apparently rather long discussion between this civilian and a Starfleet officer that had taken place right under his eye, before the dramatic disappearance of the night's main entertainment.

The Doctor came to a halt in front of an unsubtle, garishly coloured and well-lit sign. _Saleena and her Sisters,_ the advertisement blared. _Now better than ever!_ They had replaced Lemarr already, it would seem, probably assuming that the customers would neither notice nor care.

He stopped briefly when he noticed the cover charge. Since the bar had not been on the away team's itinerary this time, he had not brought any latinum with him, and the enormous Nausicaan by the entrance seemed to be there to discourage entry without payment. What was a hologram to do?

And just why was it his former assistant whom he now heard in the back of his head, whispering unsolicited advice with that unmistakable, insouciant grin audible in his voice: _When in doubt, dance!_

Resigning himself to the inevitable, the Doctor turned to the Nausicaan bouncer, schooling his features into his best tool-less maintenance guymode and channeling Tom Paris as best he could. "You, doorman. I've been told that there are problems with the lighting system."

The big brute stared at him, and moved to block the door. "No one told _me_," he growled, obviously accustomed to people trying to talk their way into the performance without shelling out the exorbitant fees charged by the owners. "And the lights are working just fine."

Inside the bar, the music picked up a beat and the lights began to flash, throwing flickering shadows against the wall of the corridor in time with the throbbing rhythm.

"The problems are _intermittent_," the Doctor said, his tone as drippingly patronizing as he could manage in light of years of practice. "Like _that. _You know – lights going on and then off, on and off, on and off?"

"Oh," the Nausicaan said, frowning. He had obviously been hired for his intimidating size rather than his towering intellect, and the EMH slipped past him in triumph before he had a chance to work things out.

Ignoring the spectacle of the three gyrating Orion women on the stage, and trying hard to shut his ears against what to his musically discriminating ear was a cacophony of discordant sounds, the EMH headed straight for the bar. The lounge was full, with customers standing between the occupied tables, swinging to the beat of the music and inhaling deeply something the Doctor's data banks readily identified as an airborne aphrodisiac, laced liberally with Orion pheromones.

But above all the jarring sensory inputs that assaulted his receptors, he detected a certain … edginess in the atmosphere. Perhaps it was a blend of the unexplained communications failure and last night's excitement? Whatever it was, it meant that his inquiries had to be at least a little bit circumspect. For a split second he was almost glad of his Narovian disguise.

"Good evening," he said, mustering his most jovial tone. "I wonder if you could help me locate someone who seems to have gotten lost. No doubt he fell for one of those women – he hasn't been seen since last night."

The barkeep snorted, and continued mixing a whole battery of sweet-smelling drinks. "And that is a problem why? Wouldn't be the first time. Those girls know their business."

"The _problem,_" the Doctor said, sharpening his tone to a somewhat finer point, "is that the man is Starfleet. And you know what _that _means. One of them gets lost, pretty soon all hell breaks loose when they come looking. So the Stationmaster has asked me to act as a sort of go-between."

The man looked at him sharply, then nodded.

"Yeah, sure, I remember this one guy who was here yesterday," the barkeep said, in response to the Doctor's inquiry about Tervellyan. "Don't get too many Fleeters here. Probably a good thing, too. Actually, I think there were two, but this one, he was talking to Darmoth Krall for a long time; they seemed to know each other. Fleeter seemed a bit troubled about something. You know, frowned a lot. Don't think he was very happy. Not too interested in the girls, actually, now that I think about it."

"Yes, I'm told this Commander Tervellyan is not the most … sunshiny officer you are ever likely to meet," the Doctor confirmed. "In fact, apparently he can be quite prickly. But if he wasn't interested in the girls, I should probably see if I can find this Darmoth Krall. Is he still on the station? Perhaps he can help me locate the Commander."

The barkeep gave a snort. "'Course he is," he said. "He's usually in his office at this time."

_His office? _The Commander had not mentioned that this duranium trader acquaintance of his had a permanent office on the station.

"Remind me where I would find that?"

"Promenade, beside the commissary," the barkeep shrugged, and turned to a paying customer. "You'll know him to see him. Aren't that many human-Rigellian hybrids around, even in these parts."

"_Thank_ you," the EMH mouthed at the man's back. He wasn't at all bad at this detective thing, he decided, preening a little. Perhaps he should ask Tom Paris for some of those holovids Jean-Luc Picard had given him and see how quickly _he_ could resolve those co-called mysteries of the Admiral's? He left the bar with a bounce in his step, having momentarily forgotten about the life-threatening situation in which he had left Commander Tervellyan.

"You see," he tossed over his shoulder at the Nausicaan bouncer as he breezed past him on his way out, "Lights are all fixed. Now they're back in rhythm with the music."

The Doctor headed down the promenade, in what he hoped was the right direction. A couple of hundred metres down the curving corridor, an unruly crowd clamouring for entrance into an over-filled facility suggested that he had arrived at the commissary; he glanced in briefly. He recognized the barrels of antigen stacked in the back, but noticed that the Starfleet markings Lieutenant Ayala had reported had apparently been removed – rather crudely, as if melted off with a phaser or a laser torch. The Doc resisted the temptation to run his tricorder over the stack to confirm the nanoprobe signature.

The entrance beside the commissary was unremarkable, and there was nothing on the door denoting a trade representation. Instead, the small metal label read "Administration". The Doctor hesitated, his hand on the door chime. Maybe seeking the assistance of a man about whom he knew nothing, and who was apparently not exactly what Commander Tervellyan had thought he was, was not such a good idea after all?

But before he could give the matter any more thought the door opened, and a man strode out. Judging by his looks – more than half human, but with the very distinctive Rigellian cheekbones that gave him, in the Doctor's views, a vaguely sinister look – it had to be Darmoth Krall.

Right behind Krall was a short and stocky man, of a species the Doctor did not recall seeing before. He started accessing his memory banks for the alien's physical parameters, but was distracted when both men stopped right in front of him. _Why was he suddenly unable to multi-task?_

"What do you want?" the part-Rigellian demanded, in a none-too-friendly tone, of the supposed Narovian who was practically blocking his exit. This was clearly not a man to be messed with, the Doctor surmised quickly, even before he recognized the voice.

The male voice, who had scanned for other intruders, in the quarters where Trevellyan had been taken.

"Ah, uh, I was looking for …" Clearly, seeking this man's assistance in locating Tervellyan would not only be ineffective, but potentially fatal. The sudden need for a change in approach left the EMH at a momentary – and rather unprecedented - loss for words, but he recovered his wits quickly.

"A doctor. I was looking for a doctor. Since the pharmacy is next door, I thought, perhaps …"

"I'm not a doctor, and that," Krall pointed at the commissary, "is not a pharmacy. Now get out of the way and piss off, Narovian. I have business to attend to."

He practically shouldered the EMH aside and started to head down the corridor, followed by his sidekick. The stocky alien beside him turned briefly to give the Doctor a penetrating stare. A frown flitted across his face and he stopped suddenly, grabbing his principal by the arm.

"I get nothing from that guy," he hissed. "And I mean, _nothing_. Never felt anything like it. In fact, it's almost like … he isn't there. He's a total blank. Must have telepathic shielding of some kind. Bears watching."

The Doctor nearly froze again as something in his memory routines suddenly became unblocked, and the name of the species the man belonged to floated to the surface. _Kintzi. _The short man was a member of an ancient, telepathic race rarely seen now this close to Federation space. They had been greatly diminished after unsuccessfully waging war against the Federation in the past; some occasionally hired themselves out to people who bore it ill will.

The very reason Tom Paris had sent him, a hologram, to the station; something suddenly clicked in his mind, triggering a host of associations, none welcome. The idea behind sending a hologram to the station had, of course, been to enable him to move around undetected where others were present; it was a different matter altogether to be confronted by a trained Kintzi one-on-one, and in an already suspicious situation at that.

Putting some distance between him and the telepath seemed like an excellent solution. The EMH turned and started down the corridor, away from the two men. He tried to shift his focus to keeping his pace steady and slow - concentrating on more than one action at a time was becoming increasingly difficult, and made him feel as if he was floating under several tons of medical gel. A thought struck him: the excess data in his memory banks seemed to be affecting his ability to process internal taskings and decision trees.

As he retreated, he heard Krall bark an order into a wrist communicator. Clearly, whatever was jamming up signals coming in and out of the station was not affecting its internal frequencies. The Doctor broke into a run; the termination of the internal command to act inconspicuously freed up at least one channel to curse Tom Paris and his bright ideas, followed by imprecations against Jarod Tervellyan and his deplorable taste in acquaintances_. _

But what was it he was supposed to remember?

_I am a doctor, not a spy, _he repeated to himself like a mantra, until he came to an intersection corner. The corridor forked off in another direction here – one of the spokes of the space station. _Straight or right? Straight or right?_

He searched his internal data bases for applicable information. Something surfaced: _Plan B. Outer rim, stay in the outer rim … _

He shook his head and resisted the temptation to turn the corner, instead continuing to run down the slightly curving, wider corridor of the main station ring. As he did so, the instructions embedded in his matrix began to crystallize further. _Plan B. _

The Doctor took off the leather jacket while he ran; he kept running even when one the PADDs fell out of the pocket and clattered onto the floor. Had he possessed the necessary processing space, he might have felt grateful that while Zimmermann's programming may have included breathing routines, it would not actually leave him winded - Narovian nostrils or not. But whatever memory space he still had access to now urged him towards the completion of one task, and one task alone: _Plan B._

"There he is!" The shout came from the spoke he had just past. The Doctor became dimly aware of a new threat to his tasking. He turned around and saw two large individuals coming after him, phasers drawn – they were possibly Nausicaan, but there was no time to check the silhouettes against his species inventory.

He slung the jacket over his left arm and started taking off his emitter as he ran. One small, unobstructed set of his perception subroutines observed with fascination as one of the sleeves started to smoke a little – a phaser burn, that had gone clear through his holographic body but had found an actual target in Tom Paris' favourite piece of clothing. He gave a mental shrug; his former assistant would probably consider this newest damage to be _cool_, when he got to see it, seeing as it matched the damage he had inflicted himself. He dismissed the extraneous thought and clipped the mobile emitter to the jacket.

There it was – the universal sign for recycling chutes: an arrow chasing its tail.

_Plan B. _

He had earlier dismissed it as one of Tom Paris' more hare-brained schemes, but in the absence of other options the execution of the plan had become paramount. Spurred on by rapidly approaching footsteps, the Doctor shoved the jacket into the opening.

"Emitter, transfer EMH," he shouted after the still-smoldering garment and its precious accessory of twenty-ninth century technology, as they disappeared down the chute. He turned towards his pursuers, staring in wide-eyed wonder at the reddish blooms of repeated phaser blasts as he faded out of existence.


	10. Extractions

**Chapter 10 – Extractions**

"Approaching Kalpak, running parallel to outer ring," Tom said as he steered the Flyer on a course designed to run a large circle around the station. "Sue, anything yet?"

"Not yet, still scanning," the engineer responded. "It'll take a few minutes, since the Doc's emitter is so small."

"Private yacht, identify yourself," came the voice of the station dispatcher. Tom ignored it.

"Focus on the recycling systems in the outer rim," he reminded Nicoletti unnecessarily. "Can you tell when they had their last cycle?"

Thanks to the need to conserve energy, most stations and ships recycled waste at fixed intervals or when sufficient mass had been acquired, rather than on a per-item basis. Objects tossed into the smaller chutes would be suctioned into larger holding tanks for that purpose, and held until the next cycle.

"Judging by the energy output of the system, it's winding up for a new cycle in approximately ten minutes," Coulthard said, his forehead scrunched up in concentration. "Last cycle was about three hours ago, before the away team went down. If he did follow Plan B, he should still be in the chute."

One of the junior members of Baytart's conn department, Ensign Paul Coulthard was a recent Academy graduate and as such among the first pilots to have received formal training on the Delta Flyer model. Tom had taken him aboard as back-up to take the Flyer back to Voyager should the need arise, but with the boss at the helm, the young man was helping out at Ops, while Schmidt held Tactical.

"Captain," Schmidt interjected, his voice betraying his concern. "If the Doc did follow the plan and really is hiding in the recycling system, won't he get … decompiled when it cycles?"

"Shouldn't," Tom answered even as he maneuvered the Flyer around a docked ship. "The emitter is made of an advanced polydeutonic alloy that the Daystrom Institute itself hasn't been able to replicate yet. So there's nothing for the system to recycle – it won't recognize the substance, and so can't convert it into anything. If the cycle does go, the emitter will be filtered out and stored until enough non-recyclables have accumulated for a sun shoot. That's also why the recyclers are always located at the outer rim; easier to take out the garbage."

Schmidt and Coulthard looked at one another with widening eyes, both having essentially stopped listening after the first word: _Shouldn't?_

With a grim smile, Tom added, "But I hope we get him out before then – he's wearing my leather jacket and I'd hate to see _that_ become someone's toast."

Nicoletti, who understood the principles involved and had been observing her companion's horror with detached amusement, gave an unladylike snort, and retorted, "Well, if something _does_ go wrong, the Doc himself would probably come out as a dill pickle."

"Or a particularly wriggly dish of gagh, with a dash of Arcturian pepper?"

The ensuing back-and-forth speculation between Voyager's Captain and Deputy Chief Engineer of what replicated dishes a recycled EMH might come back as did not particularly serve to relieve Coulthard's concern. Nothing in his four years at the academy had ever suggested that Starfleet business should be conducted in anything but the most serious manner, but based on what he had seen and heard since, those of his crewmates who were veterans of the Delta Quadrant would habitually resort to black humour - in moments of crisis. His mouth went unaccountably dry as he internalized the fact that his very first away mission might not be without actual peril. The young ensign gripped the console a little harder as his body succumbed to a sudden rush of adrenaline.

"Unidentified Delta class yacht, state your purpose," the station dispatcher came on again, her voice almost threatening now.

"Sightseeing," Tom responded, sufficiently annoyed at the interruption to snap back. "Lovely place you got here. Thinking of buying shares."

He silenced the transmission with a slap of his palm. "Sue, anything yet?"

"There," Nicoletti's voice responded, the bantering tone gone. "Got him! Near external port Gamma Twelve."

"Can you lock in transport?"

"Negative, Captain," Coulthard said. Relieved that the unaccustomed outburst of gallows humour afflicting his senior officers seemed to have been a temporary phenomenon, he too was all business, and happily so.

"Too much interference from the phase oscillators in the recycler." He looked up from his console. "It would need to be switched off manually."

"Shit," Tom muttered, shaking his head in irritation. Nothing, but nothing, was ever easy, was it? Sometimes he wondered why portable communications devices and transporters were considered such milestones in technological development; they _never_ seemed to work in a crunch.

"I'll go in with Schmidt. Coulthard, you take the conn. Sue, see if you can beam us into the corridor, within a couple of feet of the recycler the Doc jumped into. I assume we can still use our transporters, at short range at least, or are they as useless as the comm system?"

Nicoletti nodded affirmatively. "That's a yes on the first. We're good on transport in, at least in this section. Whatever dampening capacity they have seems to be limited to critical ops and the command modules."

"Anyone else in the vicinity where we're going?"

"Two bio signs, Nausicaan by the look of things, by what should be the entrance to the public chute. Tom, are you sure …?" Nicoletti did not bother to hide the concern in her voice – concern for her old friend and erstwhile would-be suitor, rather than her Captain.

He threw her a shrug and drew his phaser, changing the setting to maximum stun and telling Schmidt to do the same. _Nausicaans._ The equivalent to Earth's pachyderms, when it came to the energy output required to knock one out.

"Okay, put Arno and me behind them by ten feet. _Now_." His voice brooked no dissent, and Nicoletti moved to enter the necessary commands into her console even as she shook her head in silent disapproval.

They materialized in the corridor, phasers ready. The two Nausicaans were standing by the opening of the recycling chute, apparently debating whether they should crawl inside, and if so, which of them would be the lucky one. They turned when they heard the tingle of the transport; one spat a guttural curse and reached for the phaser he had put back in its holster.

Tom fired off two quick shots, which were followed in rapid succession by two more from Schmidt. The aliens crumpled slowly, and Schmidt moved quickly to kick their weapons out of reach before delivering another shot to their heads to ensure they would remain unconscious for some time.

"Cover me," Tom ordered as he headed for the chute.

"Sir?"

"I have to go in to disable the phase oscillators," Tom explained. "If the controls for those things were on the outside, anyone could play with them for a lark. Those things can be used for all sorts of adventures in garbage disposal, if you know just what to do. You wouldn't believe the number of juvenile idiots running around on space stations, with more energy than sense and strange ideas of a good time. But the recycling system is an important part of the energy grid; they don't like people fucking with it, so they keep it out of reach."

Schmidt did not ask exactly how his Captain had come by this rather esoteric bit of information; by now he had learned enough about Tom Paris and his … creatively rebellious adolescence that he suspected it had probably been acquired first-hand. He smirked a little to himself, shook his head discreetly and took up his post at the entrance to the chute - back to the wall, one eye on the still-prone Nausicaans - as Tom climbed in.

"Five minutes to recycling, Captain," Nicoletti's voice came over their comm badges, its warning tone unmistakable.

Tom heard her through the crackle of interference, and nodded grimly to himself as he squatted in the narrow space behind the entrance panel, his rear end almost touching the closed entrance to the chute. _Kahless, what was that smell? _Had someone stuck their head in here after a sojourn at the bar, to dispose of excess Cardassian Sunrises?

The telltale rumble that preceded the regular suction action that would ensure everything in the chute would find its way to recycling made Tom lunge for one of the rungs embedded in the wall. His feet almost lifted off the ground with the force of the drag, and he breathed out in relief as the door to the chute hissed shut again. _Shit, that was close. _Tom resolutely suppressed the unbidden memories of another chute, in another time, where he had not been so lucky. Well, at least this time the refuse at the other end would not be armed, crazed and dangerous, and help was a little closer.

He almost gagged as he wiped the access panel down with the sleeve of his uniform, to get rid of the unidentifiable, but definitely slimy, substance he had picked up from the rung and that was now sabotaging his efforts at removing the cover.

Outside, the sound of new footsteps coming down the corridor drew Schmidt's attention like a laser beam. He did not bother to determine who the newcomers were; as far as he was concerned, anyone in the vicinity was deemed to be a threat to the man who had risked his own life to get him out of a Romulan hell, and who was now risking it again to rescue a member of his crew. And if protecting that man resulted in collateral damage to an innocent nighttime stroller, so be it. One, two, three shots fired in rapid succession, and silence reigned once again.

Schmidt knew the respite would be brief, and adjusted his stance to face whatever came next. A least he would see them coming, and his present position have him a tactical advantage until such time as his phaser ran out of energy.

Inside the small recycling compartment, Tom's comm badge chirped, then hissed. The voice that came through was thin, and almost drowned out by crackling noise. He didn't waste any mental energy trying to figure out what might cause the interference, and focused instead on absorbing the information the voice provided.

"Asil to Captain Paris. Commander Tervellyan's bio signs have been shifted to the Rigellian freighter. Other bio signs are consistent with a combination of the original crew and individuals likely to have been in the escape pods. The vessel is powering up engines; the dampening fields they erected after the first away team was discovered are still in place and transport will not be possible. Shall we pursue?'

With a string of curses, directed indiscriminately at what he had just heard and the mechanical problems that tested his physical strength to its limit, Tom managed to pry the panel loose even as Asil was awaiting his response.

What was happening at this moment to Jarod? Was he being interrogated and subjected to … what? Tom closed his eyes against that last thought. His mind raced.

_Time. No time to dwell. _What were the four stages of fighting crime? _Deter, delay, analyze, respond_.

Time for the first two had passed before they had ever gotten to the Snowflakes, and deterrence did not seem to work against the Orion Syndicate at the best of times, nor could you take action to delay an enemy you didn't know was on the march.

_Analyze. _They needed to mine the data they had just obtained, thanks to the EMH. But there was no time – no time. His first officer was in their hands. Splitting the shuttle off from his ship was undesirable, but necessary under the circumstances.

_Respond. _What would Janeway do? Picard? Tom Paris …?

The speed of his answer belied the jumble of thought processes that had gone into it. "Yes, absolutely. We have a better chance of getting him back from that freighter than we do from this bloody rat's nest of a station. Go after them; incapacitate the ship if possible, board and use all necessary force if not. We'll catch up with the Flyer. Transmit your course and any required corrections to Coulthard."

"Three minutes to recycling," Nicoletti's voice came over his comm badge just as he dropped the panel on the floor, oblivious to the clattering sound. _Kahless, _the comm traffic interfering with his concentration was like Starfleet Ops Command during a Borg attack.

_There. _Tom located what must be the emergency shut-off lever. Unless it was the flush-everything-into-space-including-reckless-wannabe-Captains button? He cranked it down and hit his comm badge.

"I think I got it, Sue. Can you confirm that you have a lock on the Doc's emitter?"

A few seconds' silence stretched into an eternity before Nicoletti response crackled into the tiny room. "Affirmative, Captain. Initiating transport now."

"Make that a two cubic foot dispersal beam if you can, Sue. I'd like my jacket back." Tom cursed again as another pre-suction rumble warned him to grip the wall rungs. He raised his voice to enable it to be heard over the sound he knew would inevitably follow.

"Next, get Schmidt out of the corridor. He's too exposed. Then me. I'm climbing out of the recycler now and you should be able to get a lock on me in a second. Coulthard – you plan on getting the Flyer the hell away from this station as soon as we're all onboard. Coordinates coming from Voyager."

He materialized onboard the shuttle to the very smell he had so fervently hoped to leave behind, and the sight of his Deputy Chief Engineer pulling his sodden jacket out of a pile of refuse. With a determined look on her face that almost, but not quite, succeeded in masking her revulsion, she felt its front until she located the mobile emitter.

"Got it! Wait, there are a couple of PADDs in the pockets as well. Oh, ewww… This is so _gross._" Nicoletti swallowed, then cleared her throat to suppress her gag reflexes before continuing. "I assume you want your jacket in the refresher, Captain? I'll just beam the rest of the stuff into space. That smell …"

Despite her best efforts, she made a small retching sound, and Tom looked at her with a considerable sympathy as he stripped off his soiled – and none-too-sweet-smelling - uniform jacket.

"Lieutenant – suggest you beam the stuff into the corridor where you got me from," Schmidt interjected laconically, his deadpan expression giving nothing away. "It'll go perfectly with the Nausicaans and those other goons."

"_Other_ goons?" Tom turned to his security officer, eyebrow raised in question. Nonetheless, he nodded his approval of the Ensign's request to Nicoletti, who shrugged and entered the reverse coordinates.

Schmidt shrugged. "Couple small squads of 'em came down the hall while you were sorting out the garbage, Captain. Free range shooting, as soon as they came round the bend. Piece of cake." He mimicked a shooting action with his right finger, then blew on it. A slightly malicious grin flashed across his face as he added, "I imagined every one of them was a Romulan."

Tom raised an eyebrow at the somewhat understated report, of what must have been a harrowing few minutes for his security officer, and made a mental note to advise Ayala of Schmidt's coolness under fire. The Ensign's mental associations, on the other hand, did not faze him in the least – he had used this particular technique himself at a few critical junctions in his life.

He took the mobile emitter from Nicoletti, and wiped it on his already compromised jacket; it was bound for the 'fresher in any event, as soon as he could find a second to toss it in. He pressed the little indentation that would recall the EMH, as well as the reset function that would re-establish the hologram's normal physical parameters.

The Doc materialized, looking around wildly; his shoulders sagged in relief when he saw the familiar surroundings. He inspected his uniform sleeves and touched his face with both hands, to confirm that he had regained his usual appearance, and took a deep holographic breath through his familiar respiratory sub-matrices.

"What about Commander Tervellyan?" he asked, as soon as he had regained his composure. "Is he …"

"Still alive, yes, according to the bio reading. He's apparently being held hostage on that Rigellian freighter. No idea what they want with him, but the Syndicate has a history of kidnappings, usually for _quid pro quos_ like certain actions being overlooked. They may not have figured that he's Starfleet yet. They'd know that the Fleet has a policy of never giving in to blackmail demands so we may not hear from them anyway."

Tom swallowed briefly as he considered the long list of brave and doomed souls who had given their lives, or their mental health, in the cause of not setting the precedent that Starfleet would enter into bargains with criminals or political thugs. He agreed with the policy, but was only too familiar with the price that had been paid - including by families far away from any decisions being made, and with no opportunity to voice an opinion on their loved one's fate.

And reverberating through it all, unbidden, ever-present, was the thought of what Tervellyan's captors might want to learn, and how … and his own role in placing his XO into their hands, with a simple command.

_Don't think about that now, Paris … there'll be time for regrets and recrimination later. _Oh, he recognized that voice, tried hard to swallow its venom. For now. Yes, the time would come.

"We're going after them, with Voyager and now that we have you, with the Flyer. We will get him back, Doc," Tom said, putting as much confidence into the spoken words as he could muster. "Whatever it takes."

The comm crackled slightly, the proximity of the Snowflakes' dance leaving its apparently ubiquitous sensory footprints even in near-open space. Tom had never appreciated clean communications more than he had in the last few days, when they had been virtually impossible to maintain.

"Voyager to Delta Flyer. The Rigellian has gone to warp. Its course vector indicates that it is headed into the Narov system. The distortions will make it difficult to trace it once she gets into the gravimetric pulls caused by the current alignment. I assume you orders to pursue hold nonetheless?"

"Affirmative, Asil. Set course to follow; we'll do likewise but come in from a different angle. I assume they're headed into the Snowflakes to shake us off, but are probably aiming to go elsewhere, may Orion where we can't get at them without causing a ruckus. Hopefully one of us will catch up with them before that; once the EM emissions get too wild, they probably won't be able to hold a stable warp field."

He waited for Asil to acknowledge her instructions and close the line, but the Vulcan seemed to hesitate. _Was there anything else? _Tom recalled the privacy screen she had invoked in his ready room, and allowed himself the ghost of a grim smile. He punched a few buttons and retrieved an earpiece from under the console.

"Go ahead, my ears only. Relocate to my ready room if required."

Could Vulcans sound relieved? "Thank you, sir. One moment."

The line went dead as Asil removed herself from the curious eyes and ears on the bridge, and came back to life moments later with a sharp crackle - deep inside his ear - that almost caused Tom to jump out of his seat.

"Further to our earlier discussion, Captain, I thought you would be interested to hear that based on crew rosters and authorization levels, the only individuals with sufficient time to access and/or modify the transporter coordinates prior to our respective deliveries, apart from myself, were Commander Tervellyan, Lieutenant Commander Torres, Lieutenants Ayala and Nicoletti, Ensign Schmidt, and Crewman Cor Zelis."

She cleared her throat. "And you, sir. Begging your pardon, Captain."

_Well, I think we can rule out myself and B'Elanna. _Tom dismissed any further speculation as counter-productive for the time being, even as the list of names burrowed deep into his brain where he knew it would fester and gnaw.

"Thanks, Lieutenant. That was … enlightening. I'll reflect on what you told me. Try and correlate that information with external transmissions, if you can; maybe that'll help further refine your search. You have your other instructions. Paris out."

Tom ignored the questioning glances thrown at him by Nicoletti and the EMH; since it was his personal vessel, the Flyer was not equipped with the silencer – even if it had the space to create the necessary field – and privacy was strictly a one-way street, in favour of the caller. It was a good thing that Captains didn't have to justify themselves to their crew …

Pretending that the one-sided conversation had been a matter of routine, Tom paused for a moment to observe Coulthard handling the Flyer. The young man did so with reasonable competence, if little of the grace her owner would have brought to the task; the temptation to slide into the pilot's seat was considerable. But there were other matters for the _Captain _to attend to; flying he could delegate, regardless of how his instincts screamed otherwise.

"So, tell us what happened, Doc. Just the facts, though, please. Did you get the data?"

The Doctor briefly stared into space, as if checking something inside his head. "Yes, there is a considerable increase in volume in my matrix. In fact, I am beginning to appreciate what it feels like to have a brain tumour; I have difficulties focusing and carrying out more than one or two complex functions at the same time. The sooner Lieutenant Nicoletti can remove the files, the happier I'll be. And just what _is_ that smell?""

"Never mind the smell, Doc. As for the data clogging up your memory banks, we'll get it out as soon as possible. Tell us what happened?"

As the EMH recounted his perspective on the events of the last – had it really been only a couple of hours? - Nicoletti's head whipped up.

"You mean one of the Orion _slaves _pulled a phaser_? _I find that hard to believe."

"Who knows what one of them might feel compelled to do," the Doctor replied. "It's well-established fact that severe trauma can lead to some form of identification with your abuser. Although I have to say, she sounded as if she meant it."

"And who's to say that a woman can't be a member of the Syndicate?" Tom interjected. "Remember that freighter had escape pods for eight people, but the DNA samples Tval found came from only seven males? I've been thinking about that. Either one of the pods only had one person aboard, or one of the crew was female."

The EMH gave Tom a quizzical look "Or abstinent. That _has_ been known to happen on occasion, Captain, even if you may find that notion absurd. But yes, that _is _a possibility. And if that female was one of those rescued in the escape pods and working with Syndicate members on Kalpak Station, there could certainly be reasons for her to be housed in the quarters of a senior official."

"_Exactly_!" Despite his own relentless doubts and the seriousness of the situation, Tom could feel himself getting intrigued by this game of following clues; in fact, he was beginning to appreciate just what Admiral Picard saw in those detective holonovels of his. The data the Doc had brought back would hopefully yield more information; he knew himself well enough to admit that his curiosity went far beyond the basic need to plan Voyager's next move. _Down, Proton, down …_

"That still doesn't explain why a _woman_ would want to participate in the … abuse of other women," Nicoletti frowned.

"And just what makes you think men have cornered the market on ruthlessness?" The Doctor's voice, although it was starting to slow down perceptibly now under the weight of the unexpurgated data from Kalpak Station, still managed to hold a measure of acerbity.

"Remember Seska? She_ happily_ abandoned the Voyager crew, including Ensign Wildman who had just given birth, on that primitive planet that I and Mr. … _Captain_ Paris managed to rescue you all from. Woman, crewmate, supposed friend – none of it made one iota of difference."

Tom briefly wondered if the Doctor would ever be able to speak his rank without hesitation, or audible quotation marks. He shook off the unproductive thought as an unpleasant theory began weaving the first disquieting tendril of an as-yet-unformed thought inside his head. _The only individuals with sufficient time to access and/or modify the transporter coordinates … _

A thought not to be examined too closely – not yet.

"Whatever. Let's assume that this unknown female is a member of the Syndicate. There's certainly enough evidence to suggest that she is the one who has taken Commander Tervellyan … hostage. We would certainly want to locate heron that ship _before_ we board, if that what it comes to; there's a number of questions I'd like to ask her, so it's imperative we try and extract her."

He turned to the engineer. "In the meantime, Sue, can you download the data from the Doc's emitter into the Flyer's computer? I'd like to look at them and shoot them over to Voyager for secondary analysis, plus I don't want to risk overloading him."

For once, the Doctor – who was getting ever closer to complaining about feeling … unwell - submitted to the engineer's ministrations without complaint. Fortunately, Nicoletti's tinkering with the emitter did not require him to be taken offline, and he continued to regale the other officers with his exploits on the station. Despite the excessive pressure on his memory banks, he managed to infuse his tale in equal measure with satisfaction concerning his own ingenuity, and resentment at the … undignified escape plan to which Tom Paris had subjected him.

"Hey, the experience may have been humbling and odiferous, but it worked. You're here, aren't you?" Tom protested automatically, although his heart wasn't really in it. Something about the Doctor's tale nagged at him, the whispering thought he had tried to suppress earlier snaking more deeply, more insistently, into his mind.

_Darmoth Krall. _The man Jarod Tervellyan had talked to for virtually the entire time he was in that bar. It was almost as if a cold hand had reached into his stomach and was gripping his guts, as he replayed Asil's words in his mind:

_The only individuals with sufficient time to access and/or modify the transporter coordinates prior to our respective deliveries, apart from myself, were Commander Tervellyan, Lieutenant Commander Torres, Lieutenants Ayala and Nicoletti, Ensign Schmidt, and Crewman Cor Zelis …_

With clenched teeth and a determined frown, Tom punched his codes into the console for a private subspace link to Voyager. He turned his attention to the monitor, to ask the question to which he almost feared getting the answer.

"Asil, Paris here. Can you please check with our Orion guest what she knows of a man by the name of Darmoth Krall? Not sure if the name's real, but that's how he's apparently known on the station. Apparently he was the guy the Commander spoke with in the bar, but it seems he comes with … a bit of baggage. Needless to say, I'd like to know just how much. Paris out."

He sat back in his chair with a sigh, eyeing Coulthard at the conn with a pang of envy. There were too many balls in the air, at least one of them coated in poison. Too many questions unanswered.

Flying, by comparison, was easy …

…..

Asil stood at the entrance to the guest quarters assigned to Lemarr Valon. Had she been human, she might have hesitated, to wonder briefly whether her presence would be welcome, and how best to approach the young woman who had come to Voyager under such extraordinary circumstances. But she was not human, and she had a mission to fulfill. She chimed the door.

No response.

"Computer, locate Lemarr Valon."

The uninflected, but surprisingly warm, voice of the computer responded immediately.

"Lemarr Valon is in the nursery."

Asil raised an eyebrow and turned on her heel to re-enter the turbolift.

Her eyebrow shot up even higher when she arrived at the nursery. There was the young Orion woman, sitting cross-legged on the floor – still wrapped in Mike Ayala's jacket - trying her very best to reassemble a model of the enterprise under the expert tutelage of a two-and-a-half-year-old. A security officer stood discreetly in a corner, arms behind his back, in classic at-ease position; he came to attention at the Lieutenant's entrance.

"This is the port nacelle, Lemarr," Miral Paris said seriously, holding out a piece of her favourite toy. "It got damaged in a space a-mo-na-ly, but Mommy fixed it and now it's working again."

The expression on Lemarr's face was not quite a smile, but as she inspected the chewed-up piece Miral had given her, she appeared to Asil less tense already than when she had first seen her cross the bridge to enter the Captain's ready room.

"I regret the interruption," Asil said politely. "May I have a moment of your time, Miss Valon?"

Lemarr raised her dark green eyes to the Vulcan. "I prefer to be addressed as Lemarr," she said softly, inclining her head politely. "I am at your service."

She rose gracefully to her feet, handing the port nacelle back to Miral with a smile. "Here you go, Miral," she said. "I will be right back."

Asil waved off the security and, as was her habit, proceeded straight to her point.

"Captain Paris has requested me to inquire whether you are familiar with an individual by the name of Darmoth Krall."

There was no mistaking Lemarr's hissed intake of breath in reaction to the name. She turned a pale green and her hands clenched into involuntary fists, pulling Ayala's jacket more tightly around her shoulders. She swallowed convulsively and looked around, a cornered animal, trying to find a place to hide.

"There is no need to worry, Miss … Lemarr." Asil may not be inclined to show emotions of her own, but certainly recognized them in others. She inflected her voice in as reassuring a tone as she was able to muster. "I only require information about Darmoth Krall. You are in no danger from him on this ship."

Miral looked up from her toy Enterprise, having noticed the changed mood in her shy playmate.

Finally, the young Orion found her voice. "He is the owner," she breathed, barely audible. "Of _lodubyaln_."

Miral, who had been watching her playmate intently, stood up and took her hand. "Don't worry, Lemarr, my Daddy will keep you safe from the bad men. He's a brave warrior and likes to help people. Sometimes he gets hurt doing it and then Mommy says he's an idiot, and Uncle Doc has to fix him up. But he'll try his best to make sure _you_ won't get hurt."

Lemarr hesitated, not sure how to react to Miral's promise - so trustingly given, so far beyond her own experience. Her eyes cast around, finally coming to rest on Asil, who had remained perfectly still during the exchange. The Vulcan nodded solemnly, focusing her dark, serene eyes on Miral, and the woman whom the little girl had decided to take under her small but fiercely beating wings.

One who knew the Lieutenant well, might have detected a gleam of amusement in them, perhaps something else. Her voice, when she spoke, was even.

"Based on what my own father has told me, that is an apt description of Captain Paris, in all respects. He will indeed ensure that no harm will befall you while you are onboard this ship. You have my word on that as well. As the Acting Captain during his absence, I speak for him in this."

She waited to let her words sink in, watching the young woman's tense shoulders relax a little, her hand still in Miral's. Almost gently, she added, "Do I have your permission to pass this information on to the Captain, Miss … Lemarr?"

Lemarr's mouth opened, then closed as she blinked back a sudden tear.

_Do I have your permission, Lemarr?_

She swallowed, then licked her lips a little, unconsciously. Savouring the unexpected question like the gift it was, more precious because given without a thought: The possibility to say, _No_.

_Do I have your permission, Lemarr?_

Slowly she nodded, her lip pulled firmly between her teeth.

_Yes._

It was a gift in return, that nod. _Her_ gift. Willingly given, to these people who asked her will; who made promises that she knew beyond a doubt would be kept.

_Yes._

"Yes." Softly at first, then more firmly, as her voice became infused with the strength of her decision.

"_Yes._ Please, tell Captain Paris that Darmoth Krall is the man who bought my services, and those of the others. He profits from … from what we are forced to give, and from what is taken from us."

Then, as Asil turned to leave with a slight bow of acknowledgment and thanks, Lemarr Valon chose to give more - her life, should she be reclaimed by those who would own her.

A gift, and a weapon.

"Tell Captain Paris, beware. Darmoth Krall is not from Orion, but he is of the Syndicate. There are many more like him now, who are not Orion, who are from other worlds. From your own worlds: Rigel, Earth, Tellar Prime.

"Tell Captain Paris, the Syndicate grows."


	11. Follow the Money

**Chapter 11 – Follow the Money**

Nicoletti looked up from her console. "Data transfer complete, sir," she said, as the EMH made a show of rolling his head, as if freeing his holographic neck muscles from hours of tension.

"And?"

She shrugged, apologetically. "Nothing. I'm sorry. All there seems to be on the data the Doc absorbed from that terminal is an endless supply of records relating to the day-to-day operations of the Commissary and the Snowflake lounge: Vaccine sales; deliveries of Romulan ale; energy charges; salaries for the barkeepers; takes and pay-outs for the Dabo tables. Even overtime for the guy who keeps the wait staff robots from falling apart."

Tom frowned. "Any data on acquisition of the vaccine, or anything about the dancers? I mean, they are the main attraction in that bar, and after what we just heard from Asil and Lemarr about Darmoth Krall ..."

Nicoletti punched in a few key words, and shook her head. "No, sir. Nothing. Sorry."

Schmidt snorted, his derision not directed at Nicoletti, but at a point in the distance above her head, somewhere on the other side of the Flyer's observation window, where the warp trails were starting to flicker a little more erratically already.

"Sometimes, when it comes to business records, the path to enlightenment lies in the stuff that _isn't_ there."

Tom clapped the security officer on the shoulder and nodded his agreement. "Precisely. If these are supposed to be complete records, the omissions themselves are enough to revoke Kalpak's license for Federation dockings, if someone bothers to look. Incomplete records of personnel and salaries, no indication where goods sold on the station came from … You correlate some of that with the Dabo transactions, which Jarod called a money laundry, and that's deadly stuff for an audit."

Suddenly, the soul-sucking hours Tom had spent in his ready room studying up on the bone-dry politics of private space station development and regulation didn't seem to have been an entirely empty sacrifice. He almost heard his father's voice deep inside his head, whispering a slightly smug, _See, son – studying does pay! _He shut it down with a resolute blink.

"Sue – is there anything about the vids sold in the commissary? Ayala mentioned a whole raft of them, and Lemarr said something about making videos. Anyone claiming intellectual property rights in the stuff? Where does the money go?" Tom had long since stopped keeping track of his income from Captain Proton holovid sales – Jenny Delaney looked after that for him, just as she had after the betting pool - but he knew it was linked to records that were kept each time one of them was sold.

Nicoletti punched in a few additional commands and, obviously having gotten into the spirit of things, slapped her console with the palm of her hands.

"There are records of vid sales, but no links to any distributors. Prices recorded seem rather less than what Ayala said they were charging for those things, too."

Tom whistled soundlessly. "Remember what I said about the Syndicate trying to _look_ legit? Seems to me, that if you do something out in the open, like sell stuff in your stores, and keep _some _records about it, nobody will question you. But once you lift up the rug and look underneath, you find all sorts of unpleasant things. Or you don't, which can be just as telling."

He turned to Schmidt. "Rule #47 of the Paris School of Dirty Tricks: Never underestimate bureaucracy as a weapon of war. Arno, can you transmit this stuff to the bean counters at the Federation's Office for Corporate Affairs and Licensing? Getting a flock of auditors on the tail of the people who run Kalpak could be useful. Before they know it, they and their profits will find themselves pecked to death, if not shut down."

He started chewing on his lower lip. "Too bad though. I was hoping for a smoking gun. Guess that was too optimistic."

The Doctor gave an ostentatious sigh of his own. _All that … hassle, humiliation and risk to the Commander's life, just to track down some regulatory infractions that might lead the Federation to prohibit a few ships from docking at the station?_

His reinvigorated subroutines raced through the last few hours. Was there something he had missed, something the barkeeper or that telepath had said? He slowed down the internal replay, felt himself running down the curving corridor, the Nausicaans right behind. He could hear them barking orders at each other – conflicting orders, how curious – then …

A clattering sound. Something had fallen out of his non-holographic jacket. He kept running. What was it? A PADD.

_The PADDs he had stuffed in his pocket._

"Lieutenant," he turned to Nicoletti, who had started on a routine monitoring of the Flyer's engines. "What did you do with the PADDs that were in that disgustingly filthy jacket of the Captain's? Did you think to remove them before you put it in for a scrub?"

Nicoletti frowned for a second, then slapped the console with her flat hand. "I forgot. Of course – I should have run those things through analysis as well! I think they're still on the floor by the 'fresher. Here, I'll get them for you."

"No need," the Doctor intoned superciliously. "I have flown this vessel myself, and I do know where all the appliances are located."

Tom had followed the exchange with keen interest, and watched the Doc pick up the two PADDs. _Of course._ It stood to reason that any truly sensitive information wouldn't be kept on a central system, capable of being hacked into by anyone on the space station with a rudimentary knowledge in cryptology.

"Let me know what you get as soon as you get it, Sue," he said. "It won't take them long to figure out that the PADDs are missing, and whatever is on there, if anything, won't remain actionable intel for very long."

_Jarod may not have seen the Doc take them,_ he added mentally. Would that slow them down? When would they start wondering about them? What if they asked him, and he wouldn't be able to answer? Would they …?

Tom managed to suppress that last thought with the same ease he had many others this day, locking them up to be guarded by those finely honed defence systems he used to keep inconvenient considerations at bay until he was willing to examine them, or they had been rendered harmless by subsequent events. The technique helped him function when over-analysis would impede rapid action, but he had also learned that those unpleasant thoughts, if left alone too long, could at times come back with a vengeance …

He was almost grateful when the comm gave a chirp, followed by the telltale crackle anyone on Voyager would forever associate with the Snowflakes. Asil's uninflected voice filled the small cabin, unheeding.

"Voyager to Delta Flyer. Captain, we have analyzed the data Lieutenant Ayala and Cadet Icheb obtained from the Rigellian freighter. The logs do not show any particularly suspicious routings or declared destinations. However, a correlation by Cadet Icheb of the length of the time the ship's engines spent at warp speed and impulse, respectively, with various astrometric charts suggests that the vessel may have made repeated stops in one specific region. In particular, the data suggests that the asteroid belt circling the O-class star known as Alnitak, or Zeta Orionis, may be of particular interest."

"Thanks, Asil. Give me a second." Tom recalled a few details about Alnitak from his academy courses in astrophysics, but a refresher was clearly called for. He punched a few data into the Flyer's auxiliary console.

His memory was correct; the easternmost star in Orion's Belt, as seen from Earth, Alnitak was a triple star system; it's primary sun was an O-class sun that did not lend itself to planet formation, due to the photo-evaporation effect common to these hot blue supergiants. Nonetheless, the early observations by astronomers such as those of the Spitzer Telescope had been wrong in presuming that this meant there would be no other celestial bodies in the vicinity. Alnitak sported an asteroid belt composed of hundreds of thousands of proto-planets and planetesimals, nearly two thousand times the radius of that circling Sol's system between Mars and Jupiter.

It did not take a former Maquis – of however short-lived a career - nor a graduate of the James T. Kirk Centre for Advanced Strategic and Tactical Command, to come to the obvious conclusion: An asteroid belt of the size of the Alnitak system would provide a plethora of potential hiding places for anyone with an interest in conducting business beyond the reach of official scrutiny.

Tom punched in a few additional commands into the Flyer's computer, smiling in grim satisfaction at the result. Those seven years he'd spent as the head of Voyager's conn and navigation department did come in handy on occasion.

"You're right. Alnitak is off the freighter's current course, but they may just be trying to misdirect us, hoping to lose us in the Snowflakes' distortions. It makes sense, though, that that's where they'd be headed if there is an Orion bolt hole in the belt. You keep up the pursuit in case I'm wrong and go elsewhere; I'll take the Flyer straight there. Maybe we can head them off. Good work, team. Paris out."

He cut the connection before Asil could start listing the potential problems with sending the Flyer ahead to what could possibly be a well-established base, got up off his chair and walked over to the conn. "We'll have to cut through the heart of the Snowflakes to get there. Ensign, you up for some stormy weather?"

Coulthard swallowed. If there was a correct answer to your superior officer's question whether you felt confident about your ability to do a job, he had yet to figure it out. Coulthard's mouth opened, then closed, as his mind raced furiously. _Say no, and you'll be written off as a gutless wimp. Say yes, and you'll be considered a cocky bastard. Not to mention if you screw up … Especially with the Captain's own ship, and him being Starfleet's top pilot. Oh, hell._

Somewhat belatedly, he managed to croak out an "I think so, sir. I'll do my best.".

Tom recognized the blind panic in the young man's eyes, and decided to give in to compassion. "Tell you what. Take navigation, and we'll do this together. Consider it a learning opportunity." Coulthard's relief was palpable, and he prepared to relinquish the pilot's seat with almost unseemly haste.

Tom, for his part, tried hard not to seem overly eager as he cracked his knuckles, ready to run his fingers over the familiar array of levers and buttons. _Kahless, a spot of flying, especially a challenging one, would feel sooo good right now …_

…_.._

In the semi-darkness of her quarters on Voyager, eerily disrupted by the softly flashing lights of the yellow alert that promised spatial disturbances ahead, Crewman Cor Zelis bent over the dark, curly head of her son. She touched Algor's hair softly, almost reverently, watching him breathe deeply and evenly as he slept, blissfully oblivious to the safety harness she had slipped over his bed. Zelis knew from experience that nothing, apart perhaps from a middle-of-the-night craving for a glass of chocolate milk, would wake her boy once he was asleep.

She looked around, briefly grateful for the luxury the private quarters afforded them. Non-commissioned personnel were usually expected to share, especially on a first assignment; the presence of her five-year old son had ensured that she would not have to accept the whims of another roommate. It had been hard enough, during her training year, that she not only had had to leave the child with his father on Bajor and been forced to live with his absence, but had also had to put up with the daily ignominy of finding other people's dirty socks on the floor.

But Algor's future, she was convinced, lay far away from Bajor with its ongoing struggles for reconstruction amid religious infighting, and whatever price she had had to pay to secure it, she had done so gladly - and would do it again. As far as Cor Zelis was concerned, the two of them were finally on their way, although it hadn't been a particularly good couple of days for the transporter technician, all things considered.

Most worrisome had been the chewing out she had gotten from Captain Paris, about telling her boy the story of those dead Orion women and the one who had arrived so unexpectedly out of nowhere, the day before. Sure, he'd been kind enough, making a good show of the idea that he was just talking as one parent to another. But she was convinced that the fact that it had been his own daughter who'd been the recipient of Algor's breathless retelling of her own indiscretion, had allowed just a little … edginess to creep into the Captain's voice. Not the best way to come to the attention of the man who, according to the whisperings on the lower decks, was still looking with a certain wariness at those members of his crew who had not previously served with him. She would have to be more careful, or she might not pass probation.

Then there had been the … intense scrutiny she had felt when the Acting Captain came in to the transporter room review the last week's personnel logs. Why the Lieutenant had done so personally - rather than leaving the task to one of her subordinates or relying on their reports - was a mystery to the young Bajoran, but it was the Vulcan's penetrating gaze that had really left her on edge. Maybe the mistake she had made, showing her ignorance of certain advanced possibilities in transporter technology in front of several senior officers, hadn't been sufficiently made up for when she had pointed out those irregularities in the delivery coordinates?

Zelis took a deep breath, and allowed herself one last stroke of Algor's head, trying to let the tension seep through her fingers as she did so. They were a team, she and the little guy, and sometimes she marveled at the strength she managed to derive from his presence in her life. The memories of the displacement camps where she had grown up; the indignities of extreme poverty; her parents' inability to move beyond their acceptance of victimhood as a state of being; the fights with Algor's father when she had declared her intention to leave Bajor – it all vanished into thin air with his smile.

She was exhausted, and with the promise of a rough flight ahead she knew that she should be curling up beside him and getting some sleep. But there were still things to be done, and this was the time to do them.

The Acting Captain's prohibition on external communications complicated matters, and in light of her fears regarding her status of the ship, she almost considered postponing what she had to do. Almost. Zelis headed over to her private comms terminal, steeling herself for what came next with a mixture of fear and determination.

If there was one thing Cor Zelis knew with complete clarity, it was that she would allow nothing, _nothing_ to stand in the way of her child's future.

…..

"Captain," Arno Schmidt's voice cut through Tom's preparations to take the helm. "As soon as you've entered the new course, I think you'll want to see this. The codes on that PADD, by the way, were grade school level. If those Orion types want to get somewhere, they need to get themselves someone with Starfleet encryption training."

As Tom winced a little at the artless observation, the Ensign called the PADD's contents up on the main screen. An interactive map of the Narov system appeared, with each planet blinking enticingly, waiting to be tapped for further information.

"Here, look at this, sir." Schmidt zoomed in on Nemoth II; immediately, the image expanded to show a rotating schematic of the planet. A cluster of blinking lights was superimposed on the capital, but there were additional markers in the main population centers. He focused in further on one of the points.

"Nemoth Central Medical Authority," he said, his voice quivering with ill-concealed excitement. "A list of locations, names, designations. Look at this guy, here, for example. He's listed as working for Antal Faradh, the doctor we arranged delivery of the antigen with."

Tom whistled soundlessly. "No wonder the poor woman kept looking over her shoulder when she was talking to us! She _knew _they'd be grabbing the stuff before she could even get her hands on it, and couldn't stop them! Wonder what they used to get her to play along? A phaser to the head? Threats to her family and staff?"

"Whatever it was, I think we hit pay dirt, sir," Schmidt's gleeful voice cut through his musings. The Ensign was practically beaming with sheer exuberance, a sight Tom would not have believed possible less than a year ago when he had first met him, the desiccated husk of a man lying listlessly on a rough cot inside a Romulan prison camp. His excitement now was infectious, but Tom wasn't quite ready yet to concede success, even as he could feel the Doctor start to preen with pride behind him.

"Go to Parok IV, Ensign."

Schmidt obliged; the PADD yielded similar information on that world – different locations, of course, but similar connections with their second delivery point, as well as a disconcerting cluster of names apparently located in the planet's central administration.

"Arren." A few obliging clicks, more names.

"Pekal III."

As Tom reamed off the list of the members of the Narovian Union, one by one, and saw with his own eyes the depth to which the people on Krall's contact list appeared to have penetrated all levels of government there, the truth of Lemarr's assertion begun to shine as bright as the points of light on the screen: _The Syndicate grows … _

With sudden, blinding clarity, Tom saw a number of additional puzzle pieces fall into.

By all appearances, the Orion Crime Syndicate had started to metastasize into the very heart of the Union – its law enforcement, administrative and political institutions. There numbers weren't great yet, if the list was complete, but agents were strategically placed: Satellite operatives, who would, if left alone for a few years, allow the Syndicate to hold the Union in its lethal grip as surely as it now ruled Orion III, and allow it to operate its most profit-making ventures with virtual impunity. There was no knowing how many thugs and minions were surrounding each operative, of course; somehow Tom doubted hired help like the Doc's Nausicaans would feature on Krall's master contact list.

The outbreak of the Magellanic blood virus had obviously offered the Syndicate a golden opportunity to expand its power, probably beyond its wildest ambitions. Tom knew, from his insatiable interest in twentieth- and twenty-first-century history, that instability and fear were fertile breeding grounds for those who would wield power for their personal benefit. Whether their business was drugs, weapons, or the exploitation of sentient beings, criminals, as surely as war profiteers, thrived on chaos. Clearly, for the Orion Syndicate, holding the health of a population hostage in the midst of an interplanetary pandemic must have been something akin to seizing the Holy Grail.

And as a bonus, by making it appear – as Ayala had learned - that it was Starfleet arrogance and selectiveness that limited the distribution of the antigen, the Syndicate would also be able to ensure that the Federation wouldn't be welcome in this part of space, even by ordinary members of the public. No one would be in a position to interfere in its more lucrative business ventures for a very long time.

But as Tom stood there, watching the insidious points of blinking evil among the peaceful worlds that made up the Narovian Union, his mind started to race. How do you attack a multi-headed hydra? Surely you would need more than one sword …

His thoughts were disrupted by the EMH.

"Well, Mr. Paris, what we seem to have here is something like … a Who-Is-Who of the Orion Syndicate's contacts in the Narov system."

The Doctor's voice, clearly craving validation, was as smug as Tom had ever heard it, and for once he didn't mind too much. The Doc had earned a moment in the sun, he figured, even if he himself was unable to share in any feelings of triumph quite yet.

"Yeah, you did it, Doc. You and …"

"… Commander Tervellyan," the EMH completed the sentence, deflating perceptibly at the thought of the price that may have been – or might yet be - paid for the information now scrolling down the screen before their eyes.

"Yes. And Commander Tervellyan," Tom added softly.

_Jarod Tervellyan. _The man who had known just whose quarters were worth breaking into; who knew the man Lemarr Valon had fled from well enough to spend an hour talking to him in a bar - but who was last seen in the presence of that same man, with a phaser to his chest …

If any of this made any sense, Tom had yet to see it. More than anything, he wanted to talk to his XO, to allow him to shed some light on a few things.

"Let's go and get him back. But first I need to have a chat with the Admiralty."

It would not be long before Darmoth Krall would discover the PADDs missing, if he hadn't already. Any window for action would be short, and the idea that was developing in his mind at breakneck speed required immediate execution. Not to mention assistance. Tom Paris might be ready to concede, after all these years, that he wasn't a half-bad battle strategist, but to rid eight worlds of criminal infiltrators who looked no different from anyone else around them, was probably a job more suited to people with several years of war against the Dominion under their belt. And a fleet at their disposal.

"Sue, get me a subspace channel to Starfleet Headquarters. Admiral Nacheyev's office."

If Nicoletti hesitated at the thought of her old friend, once her rank equal - during his period of demotion - so casually requesting to speak with the most senior officer in Starfleet, it was only for a fraction of a second.

"Channel open, sir."

"This is Captain Tom Paris, USS Voyager, currently on the Delta Flyer. Request priority direct access to Fleet Admiral Nacheyev, Command authorization Paris Omega Tri-Beta Pi."

The watch officer twitched a little nervously at the code, and started to open her mouth in question. Tom, for once not in the least inclined to politeness, effortlessly channeled his father's haughtiest, most dismissive tone. "And before you ask, _Lieutenant, _no, I do _not_ wish to speak with you, or with Nacheyev's EA. Only the Admiral. _Now. _ _Alone_."

He waited in stern silence until the face of the Head of Starfleet blinked onto the screen before him, one eyebrow raised, an ironic smile playing around her lips.

"Captain Paris," she intoned, her own inflection managing to impart an equal mixture of measured professional interest, amused tolerance, and veiled threat. "What an unexpected … pleasure. I didn't expect to hear from you quite this _soon_, and with _this_ … level of urgency. I trust youhave an _excellent_ reason for disrupting my meeting with the Federation Chancellor and the High Representative of Vulcan?"

Tom swallowed a little, and licked his lips in an unconsciously nervous gesture. In his eagerness to talk to the Admiral, he hadn't really considered what else she might be doing – nor that he, the most junior Captain in the 'Fleet, was necessarily the man who should be keeping her from doing it.

But even at his most insecure, a determined Tom Paris was not easily derailed. At least, he figured, he hadn't gotten her out of the shower, or having sex with Bullock and Hayes. _Shit, where did that come from? Stow it, Paris … _Disrupting a discussion with some politician the Ice Queen probably barely tolerated was something Picard would deem to be an acceptable tactical risk, and he forged ahead undeterred.

"Apologies, Admiral, and yes, yes I do." Knowing the Admiral's appreciation for succinctness, Tom summarized in the briefest terms his analysis of the Orion Syndicate's likely ambitions in the Narov system, culminating in their infiltration of the Union's member states' governance systems.

"Are you saying that Orion is trying to take over the Narovian Union?" Nacheyev was leaning forward on her desk now, her eyes focused and intent.

"I don't believe it is the government of Orion _per se_, Admiral, although from what I understand it's not easy to distinguish between them and the Syndicate. I also don't think their interests are political, to the extent that they want to run the place. Based on what else I've seen, they're motivated by profit, and their various lines of business are best practiced when the local government is looking the other way - either because it's unstable and too busy, or happily in their pocket."

He paused for a moment. "We have, by the way, sent some information to the relevant Federation Agency that will cause them to check into the operations of Kalpak, and its suitability as a docking station for Federation vessels."

Nacheyev looked at him thoughtfully, all traces of ironic detachment drained from her features. "I see. And the current urgency is …?"

Tom took a deep breath. "If you send me your command codes, I will transmit information that might enable Starfleet to excise a large number of the Syndicate's operatives from key positions. Right now, with the quarantine in place, they may not be able to get their people out before Starfleet can move in."

The Fleet Admiral remained silent but gave him an encouraging nod to go on, while she tapped a few commands into her console.

"I believe what we're looking at here is the beginning of what in the twentieth century was called an asymmetrical conflict. Starfleet wouldn't be proceeding against a star system or a central government, but individual, private actors who are basically underground. I won't pretend to be an expert in this sort of thing, but our methods would probably have to be a bit … more unorthodox. We'd also need the help of locals they haven't bribed yet, so there's some diplomatic effort involved. And we can't count on a clean, or even a decisive, victory in the short term. Best we can hope for, at least for now, is to disrupt and delay, and prepare for a longer fight."

Nacheyev nodded again, silent, thinking. Tom did not dare interrupt; he'd said his piece. The next move was Starfleet's.

The Admiral looked at the information she had called up, and took a deep breath.

"Thank you, Captain. Based on latest data, we have six ships within two to four days' journey to the Snowflakes proper. Transmit your information to my assistant and …"

"No," Tom's reaction was visceral, and probably rather more blunt then Nacheyev was used to hearing from any of her subordinates. She raised an eyebrow, and that slightly dangerous gleam stole back into her pale eyes.

"Apologies, Admiral, but … there are indications that the Syndicate has operatives inside Starfleet. Your new assistant has been in place for less than a month, right? I would highly recommend that at this point, only trusted senior officers be provided with this information."

The indignation in Nacheyev's eyes was permitted to dim and she was attentive again, waiting for more. Tom, for his part, studied his fingernails for a second, before looking straight at the screen, not at the other officers in the cabin of the Flyer of whose presence he was only too aware. He knew that they would all hear his next words, including one who was on Asil's list.

A judgment call needed to be made. _So be it. _

"You will also need to know that there are indications that someone onboard Voyager has been cooperating with the Syndicate. We haven't been able to ascertain who. So for now, recommend you not advise Voyager of any forward planning by the Fleet. Only the Flyer, only me, until I get back onboard."

Nacheyev's eyebrows went up, but unlike Nicoletti, whose gasp must have been audible over the comm line, she allowed her legendary cool to prevail. She understood perfectly.

"Fine, Captain. I will transmit my personal codes to you … now."

Tom's eyes went briefly to his console, where the promised information flickered onto his screen. He made the link to the PADD, entered the transmittal codes, and waited until Nacheyev in turn acknowledged receipt.

Her next words were measured. "And you? What do you propose to, if not join whatever ships we can send to the Narov system?"

"Voyager and the Flyer will try and recover a member of my crew, who was captured by a member of the Syndicate while securing the data I just sent you. His captors likely include the people responsible for the deaths of those Orion women we reported earlier. We're heading to the Alnitak asteroid belt, where the Syndicate may have an operating base. We expect to be there in approximately …"

He looked a question at Coulthard, who, having followed the conversation intently, quickly splayed the fingers of both hands three times. "… thirty hours with the Flyer, on the most direct course. Longer, if we have to drop out of warp more than once as we cut through the Narov system. Any back-up Starfleet could provide us coming from that end, say any ships that are near Rigel now, would be gratefully accepted."

Fleet Admiral Alynna Nacheyev was without any doubt the single most powerful individual in Starfleet, and as such was concerned at any given time with the well-being of dozens of worlds and the movements of hundreds of starships. But she was still a human being, and there was something in the way Tom Paris' voice had caught, in the way he looked at her when he mentioned the captured crewmember, that made her ask the question.

"Who?"

"Jarod Tervellyan. My First Officer." Quite unnecessarily, he added, "Your former EA, sir."

He watched Nacheyev's mouth tighten a fraction as she reached for the disconnect, but her voice betrayed nothing when she said, "Thank you, Captain. We will follow up. And good luck with your mission. We'll be in touch as appropriate."

The screen dark, Tom turned with an unaccustomed weariness, to find his fellow officers staring at him. He briefly – and irrelevantly - marveled that the EMH had been able to hold off making any comments as long as he had, but even he presumably understood that interrupting an exchange with the head of Starfleet was not recommended. All four were clearly waiting for their Captain to make the first move, to provide an explanation for what they had just learned. It would have to be decisive; this was no time for apologies, or explanations.

"So now you know," he said. "We have an infiltrator. You'll understand why this information has been on close hold. Until further notice, there will be no transmissions back to Voyager to anyone but Asil or Torres, and by no one but myself. Are we clear?"

He watched Coulthard and Schmidt swallow, as the fact sunk in that their own immediate superiors' names were not on that list - that very short list. One by one, all four nodded.

'Right then," Tom snarled, perhaps a little more savagely than he had intended. "Mr. Coulthard, Warp 8.5 until we're forced to drop out. Let's see what kind of dance the Snowflakes have in store for us."


	12. Tarantella

**Chapter 12 - Tarantella**

"I can't hold a stable warp field, Captain!"

The cabin of the Flyer rocked again, a series of sudden jerking, jarring bounces that for all in the world felt as if the small ship had hit something, or a few somethings. The impacts rattled the occupants' teeth and caused even the Doctor, who normally made a point of pretending to float above mere disturbances with holographic superiority, to succumb to the urge to hold onto something.

It was a testimony to the force of the gravimetric shears common inside the heart of the Narov cluster during the current alignment of its multiple suns, that they affected even the in-between of warped space. Of course, what was happening inside the Snowflakes was not limited to gravitational forces, but included a toxic cocktail of electro-magnetic emissions that bounced off and reinforced one another, solar flares, ion storms and related phenomena, all of which were much more fun to read about in astrophysics treatises than they were when encountered live.

"Let me give you a hand," Tom managed to get out to Coulthard, as he straightened out in the helm's auxiliary seat. Any additional minute they could eek out of the Flyer at warp speed would shorten their journey to Alnitak, not to mention lessen their exposure to the storms outside in real space where there ferocity was virtually unrestrained.

If there was one thing Tom hated down to his pilot soul, it was ion storms – he had escaped two with his life hanging by a thread. One had left him and B'Elanna floating in space, the second had seen him and the Flyer buried under 30 metres of benomite. In both instances, oxygen depletion had become a rather acute concern, and he wasn't keen to find out whether 'three' really was a charm.

"Here, watch this," he told Coulthard as he made his fingers dance across the board. "Deflectors at max, shields at 50% …"

"Why shields?"

"Solar flare radiation," Tom replied briskly. "Fifty percent is enough to keep most of the really icky stuff from giving us a sunburn. Any more, you divert too much power from structural integrity, which matters in the buffeting we're about to get. Sensors at max, looking for gravimetric shears. Now look at that."

He pointed to a pattern in the console that showed two waves on a criss-cross pattern headed straight for the Flyer. "Don't try and fly through that, Paul. If you stay just above it, with the deflectors on max like we have them now, you can kind of bounce off it, like …" another rattle went through the cabin, but with nothing like the force of the previous ones.

"…this. See? Here goes the other one. Skim 'em, like a pebble on waves. You ever do that as a kid? We used to spend our summers by the sea, and ..." Another bone-rattling bump momentarily stopped Tom's childhood reminiscences.

"I'd already done some flying then, and thought why couldn't you use _that_ approach when flying through crappy conditions in space? I mean, a wave is a wave is a wave, right? Only works with a shuttle though, most starships have too much … ouf, here we go … _mass_ to bounce off properly. Would tear holes in the hull. Of course my Dad wouldn't let me try it, I was only what, ten, twelve? So I had to wait until I got a spot on Nova Squadron. Helped get us our fourth Rigel Cup, in fact. Nice ships, the Squad used in those days. Here, you try it."

"_Mister_ Paris," the Doctor's voice intruded, its tone halfway between petulant and annoyed. The sight of Tom in his element at the helm – and deeply into one of his stream-of-consciousness piloting monologues – erased whatever rank considerations he might have had from his memory subroutines.

"I'm _so _glad you're enjoying this little adventure, but may I remind you that this is not one of your simulated training sessions. This shuttle is _very_ real, as are the conditions you're flying through, and your … _playing around_ is causing the remainder of the crew considerable discomfort. In fact, Lieutenant Nicoletti is getting space sick."

"I'm okay," Nicoletti said faintly and inaccurately, but valiantly, "I think it's just what's left of the smell from that garbage. I'm sure if I could up environmental controls a bit, especially the air exchange, and route more power to the inertial dampeners, I'd be …" the next bounce swallowed her final words, and she turned another shade of pale green, barely suppressing a retch.

"Sorry Sue, Doc," Tom said, watching intently to see whether Coulthard would manage to skim the next gravitational wave. He clapped the younger man on the shoulder when the Flyer suffered another one of its shudders, but nothing more.

"Good job, Paul, you're getting it! Truth is, folks, this is still a heck of a lot better than what we'd have to deal with if we were on impulse. Suggest you give everyone an anti-nausea hypo, Doc, including me. I suspect we'll be dropping out of warp any second now, and then …. _Shit_."

True to his word, the warping stars outside the view screen shortened until they were points of light rather than rainbow-hued streaks, and both the buffeting and the stress on the Flyer's hull increased four-fold.

"Suggest now is a really, really good time for those hypos, Doc," Tom managed to grind out between his teeth, before more urgent matters caught his attention. "Paul, correct course to eight-oh-four-point-niner-niner, unless you want to head straight into that ion storm."

"Mr. Paris …"

"Not now, Doc, you do your job, let me do mine." Tom's tone brooked no contradiction, and the EMH wisely suppressed the temptation to point out that the Captain was actually doing someone else's at the moment.

"Sir, the pull from that front is too great, I'm not sure I can avoid …"

"Yes we can, if we manage to get into the shadow of Alldor Prime and then slingshot around it…" Tom's voice drifted off, as he focused on the controls, his hands a blur now, his face grim.

"Slingshot?" For a moment, the Doctor looked horrified, even if he was the least likely member of the Flyer's crew to suffer any lasting damage as a result of the wild roller-coaster ride the shuttle was currently on.

"Got it!" Tom's flat hand hit the console in momentary triumph, and for a blissful three or four minutes, the Flyer was gliding evenly, at full impulse.

"Man, this weather sucks." Schmidt, who usually was happy to comment – however laconically – on what was going on around him – had been sitting in uncustomary silence for the last little while. With the Doctor's hypospray having finally allowed him to open his mouth again without fear of losing his stomach contents, and secure in the knowledge that he had already lived through the worst part of his life, he now felt perfectly free to voice his opinion to the cabin at large.

"Why do people even live here? I mean, if it's this bad out in space, what the hell must it be like on the surface of those benighted planets when they start pulling against each other like that?"

Tom's mission preparations had added considerably to what he had absorbed about the Dance of the Snowflakes as an astrophysics major, and he found himself happy for once to be able to pull a Janeway – being the Captain Who Knows Something About Everything. Of course, he wouldn't be able to do it with her nonchalant, scientific eloquence, but he figured the key to impressing people was not to sound like you were just mouthing your briefing notes.

"Well, for one thing, it's not always this bad. This kind of alignment happens only about every ninety years or so, I think. And yeah, things do get a bit rocky on the surface of most of the inhabited planets too – extreme tides, fissure volcano eruptions, massive storm systems that can ruin crops on a global scare, that sort of thing. But the Narovians have pretty well perfected earthquake-proof housing, and no one lives too close to the coast unless it's up really high."

"Not a good time to have a pandemic happening, is it," Schmidt responded. "Add some locusts and a bunch of aliens on horseback, and you have the basis for a pretty good doomsday cult."

"Well, personally I think the Orion Syndicate qualifies on either count," Tom replied grimly.

And then all other discussion was suspended in the face of Coulthard's sudden exclamation:

"Captain, the storm is catching up!"

Tom spat out a curse between his teeth, and made a quick calculation. The Flyer's proximity to the nearest celestial bodies – the outermost planetoids of the Alldor system – made going to warp risky, but there was open space ahead for half a parsec and they should be able to re-establish a warp field at least in the short term. Perhaps his 'skimming pebble' metaphor could benefit from an expansion, and the shuttle be submerged in warped space for brief periods of time?

He wheeled around, and gave a brief explanation of his idea to his co-pilot, even as he entered the necessary commands. This wasn't the first time he'd taken the Flyer to warp in a tight space …

"Hold on, folks!"

With a flash and a sudden jolt, the Flyer went back to warp just as the outlying front of the ion storm threatened to seize her in its grip. Tom expelled a little air through pursed lips in relief. Schmidt was right – the weather out here sucked.

…..

B'Elanna entered the Captain's ready room, where Asil had taken up temporary residence; the Vulcan had taken Tom's earlier invitation as the logical basis for blanket permission to do so, given the kind of restrictions under which she had found herself operating.

Always happier near her warp core than the bridge, B'Elanna, for her part, was perfectly fine with temporary command having passed to an officer junior to her in rank. But that didn't mean she had to show Asil any particular deference, particularly across a desk that held several holovids of her own daughter. She came straight to the point.

"I thought you should know that records have disclosed a private communication last night," she said. "Crewman Cor Zelis. It was not her first such communication, either, although the first since the general prohibition."

Asil raised an eyebrow. "Do you have any indication as to the recipient of these communications, Commander?"

"We're still trying to isolate the precise destination; it turns out Cor is pretty good at encryption. But the recipient seems to be located near Bajor, or in the former DMZ. The transmissions appear to be fairly regular in nature – daily, in fact. Usually at night, we found."

"_We_? I thought I had requested that you carry these investigations out on your own, Commander."

"I asked Ayala to assist. He's not up to full duty yet, but he can certainly go through comms logs while sitting at a console. You may not have noticed, _Lieutenant_, but we're going through a rough part of space, and Engineering is a busy place. I can't be everywhere."

Seeing that Asil was about to protest, despite the deliberate reminder of their relative seniority, B'Elanna decided to take the bull by the horn.

"You know," she began unceremoniously, "I probably shouldn't be telling you how to do your job. Tom gave you the bridge, and I'm not arguing with that decision. But if you want to be the Acting Captain, in a time of … well, maybe not crisis quite yet, but a time of _certain strategic decisions_ being required, and without a First Officer, you should really consider having staff briefing sessions. We're a team here."

Asil hesitated for the briefest of moments, before coming to a decision. "A team that may include an infiltrator who is working with the Orion syndicate," she said. Caution is advised."

B'Elanna frowned; Asil probably thought she was telling her something new, but given her request to track communications – not to mention the news regarding the transport manipulations – it didn't take Vulcan logic to add one and one, and arrive at two. In fact, she had been spending whatever time she could spare mulling over the implications of the situation for Voyager's crew. But …

"Among the senior staff?" she said, her voice incredulous. "I mean, with the exception of Commander Tervellyan and yourself, I've known everyone for years. I find that hard to believe. Ayala, Baytart – of the senior officers currently on the ship – if you're suspecting one of them, or Icheb for that matter, since he seems to be running Ops for you right now, you're really carrying Vulcan paranoia a bit too far."

In a more conciliatory tone, she added, "You know, your father once recommended that one of our senior officers, Chakotay, be left out of an operation to flush out a traitor. It worked, but the price that was paid by that lack of trust was pretty high. It was months before some people were talking to each other again, and although nothing more was ever said, I think both Janeway and Tuvok realized that the approach had been a mistake."

She shook her head slightly when she remembered that - however irrational her own reaction had been - Tom's inability to share with her the real reasons for his actions in the month leading up to his departure from the ship had probably set back their eventual relationship by at least a year. Official secrecy had their place, but trust among friends did not just have to be earned, it had to be given.

"The point is, if there's a traitor among the senior officers, he or she will show their colours sooner rather than later, and if key people know what to look for, it'll be sooner. Keeping people like Baytart, Ayala and Icheb from discussing tactical decisions at this time can't be helpful. They bring an experience to the table that you can't afford to cut yourself off from. I'm sure Tom would agree – in fact I know that he would. He already regretted not telling anyone about the nanoprobes in the antigen. As a former colleague of ours would tell you, _serial consultations are inefficient_. _It's best to work as a collective._"

Having said her piece, she turned to leave. "If there's nothing else …?"

Asil held very still for a moment, as she worked through what she had just been told. "Thank you Commander. What you have said is … logical. Please remain here, and I will request Lieutenants Ayala and Baytart and Cadet Icheb to join us."

…..

The three men's faces betrayed their disbelief, as they digested what they had been told. Icheb in particular seemed utterly thrown off his stride – such as it was, given that he was still marveling at finding himself included in senior briefings. His eyes, huge with unasked questions and a dash of panic, darted from officer to officer.

Unusually, it was Ayala who found his voice first. "It certainly doesn't make sense for Crewman Cor to be involved with the Syndicate, regardless of those transmissions. It was her and Murphy that first discovered the irregularities with the transporter and told us about them. Why would she work with Murphy on that, and then point it out to us, if she's with the Syndicate?"

Asil returned his challenging stare with an impassive glance. "It has been known for individuals in a situations such as this to secure credibility by _appearing_ to be cooperative, by disclosing non-vital information. Since Voyager was being prevented from making further deliveries by the conditions in the Narov system, and since it became known that the antigen already diverted had been rendered traceable, Cor would have nothing to lose in showing how the original diversion had been effected."

B'Elanna thought about this, and frowned. "Maybe, but I'd find that hard to believe; she seems a decent person, completely focused on her kid. Miral and Algor play together, and I've met her a few times. But I suppose we could install a duplicate emitter in her console so we can monitor any future transmissions."

"You mean, tap into her comm line? Sure," Ayala shrugged. "Consider it done."

Baytart and Icheb, both a little subdued, summarized the ship's current status in tandem, navigation and ops being equally implicated in their current pursuit of the Rigellian. The freighter, according to long-range sensors, had clearly made an effort to lead its pursuer straight into the volatile environment of the Narovian system. Not surprisingly, it must have found the going less pleasant – and possibly more prejudicial to the freighter's structural integrity – than anticipated. According to Baytart, the ship had changed course to avoid the worst of an incoming ion storm and appeared for the time being headed towards Rigel, but its current arc was still consistent with a possible destination somewhere in the Alnitak Belt. The pilot briefly wondered what the Flyer was going through, on its 'short cut' right through the centre of the gravitational mayhem.

"Please transmit this information to Captain Paris on the Delta Flyer," Asil said, but Baytart wasn't done yet.

"I've an idea that might lead them to believe we've gone away. We could simulate a couple of explosions by venting warp plasma when we reach the edge of that storm, then hide out for a bit in the shadow of one of the planetoids around Alldor. They might think we got either blown up or discouraged."

B'Elanna nodded excitedly. "That could work! If we put on the ablative armour and modify our shields to resonate in the omicron band, we won't look anything like we did before, if that freighter has the means to detect us at all. We can resume pursuit and not have them know we're behind them. Would give us the element of surprise when we get there."

Asil exchanged glances with Ayala, the Chief Tactical Officer, who shrugged and nodded. _Sure. Delta Quadrant subterfuge …_

"A viable plan, with a certain logic to it, Commander," she said. "And you are certain, Lieutenant Baytart, that you are able to simulate such a potentially catastrophic event?"

"No problem," the conn officer responded. "We've done that sort of thing with Voyager before. The Captain was at the helm at the time, of course, but he ran holosims for the other pilots afterwards. Piece of cake, besides Commander Torres knows what to do."

"Excellent," Asil said. "Thank you for this excellent suggestion. Commander, we will proceed accordingly. Please advise when you are ready to engage the plasma exhaust. So unless there is anything else, you are dismissed."

B'Elanna rose, barely suppressing a triumphant smile as she left the room with her usual energetic stride to head back to Engineering. Tom would be pleased; they'd turn this mixed crew into a team yet. And she didn't even have to break anyone's nose ...

Ayala, for his part, was almost at the exit when Asil called him back.

"Lieutenant Ayala, a moment of your time." He stopped and turned back, puzzled.

"I have noticed that our Orion guest is continuing to wear your jacket. I assume she has your consent in this? I need not remind you that it is not permitted for non-Starfleet personnel to be wearing Starfleet attire."

Ayala hesitated briefly, then shrugged. "Yeah, I know. But it seems to give her … something she needs right now." He searched for the right words.

"When I was in the Maquis, and even before, in the colonies, I met a lot of refugees, people fleeing the Cardassians. I was one, for a while. It's tough, being on the run, especially when there is nothing left where you're from, and you have no idea what there is to go _to._ She seems to like Starfleet, so I gave her the jacket. Something to hang onto. Besides, she's always cold."

Asil stilled, and cocked her head. Her father had been correct; there was much to be learned from these humans and the … logic of their emotions.

"Thank you, Mr. Ayala. I believe you are correct. Miss Valon has impressed me with both her determination and her personal integrity. She would do credit to whichever endeavour she eventually chooses and should be encouraged."

…..

Twelve hours spent in intense battle with the elements, in and out of warp, had taken their toll on the crew inside the Flyer. Sue Nicoletti - who had long since given up any pretense at stoicism together with her stomach contents, but had worked miracles maintaining the shuttle's structural integrity and keeping its inertial dampeners online - was finally peacefully asleep on one of the aft cots, thanks to one of the Doc's hyposprays.

Coulthard was in the other bunk, despite his protests that Tom had the greater claim even as he nearly collapsed from exhaustion. The last few hours of dancing to the Snowflakes' tune had been the most intense flight experience of his life, and he had for the moment completely forgotten that the fellow pilot who had guided him through it was not someone he was entitled to contradict.

"You've earned yourself a real bed, Paul, so don't argue," Tom had told him sternly. "Besides, I'm your Captain and can tell you to shut up. Don't make me. Now go to bed. That's an order."

Schmidt, who could sleep just about anywhere and anytime, had strapped himself to one of the consoles to avoid being flung around too badly and was passed out on the floor, snoring intermittently. Tom switched off the comms channel and walked over to give him a little nudge with his foot. He turned over without waking, and his breathing became even again.

Voyager seemed to have matters well in hand at their end for the time being, as well; he'd even managed to sneak in a couple of minutes for a subspace 'good night' chat with Miral. Time to take advantage of what downtime there was to be had. He turned to the EMH. "Hey Doc, your matrix back to normal yet?"

"It most certainly is, Mr. Paris. Sufficiently so, to tell you that you require some rest yourself. Something I repeatedly pointed out to Admiral Janeway. If we are to be successful in our rescue attempt, you will need to have such wits about you as you are able to muster. So follow your own advice, and go to sleep already."

Tom gave him a lopsided grin and engaged the autopilot. "Relax, Doc, you're preaching logic to a Vulcan. I was just checking whether you feel ready to turn on your Emergency Command routine for a few hours. The ship can pretty well fly itself for a bit, and we may as well make use of your holographic superiority."

Tom hesitated for a moment, willing to endure the Doctor's glare in favour of a last-minute systems check and a trip to the refresher and the storage cabinet, where the thermal blankets were being kept. He spread one over Schmidt before stretching his long body out on the floor and balling his clean – if somewhat more tattered – leather jacket into a pillow to cushion his head. B'Elanna would probably want to make him throw it out now, but as far as he was concerned it still had years of wear in it, and the extra hole just gave it character.

"Wake me if we run into something – or somebody," he said, stifling a yawn. He was asleep before the Doctor got a chance to respond.

…..

"Mr. Paris. _Mister Paris, please wake up." _ The Doctor rolled his eyes in exasperation, debating whether his dignity would allow him to bend down and shake the object of his frustration. Desperate times called for desperate measures, he decided, and cleared his throat.

"_CAPTAIN!_"

"Hunh?" Tom, never at his best when freshly awakened, stirred and shook his head, instantly regretting the motion when his stiff neck and back complained. "Ow, shit. Should have taken Coulthard up on his offer of the bunk. I'm getting too old to crash on the floor. What is it?"

"I thought you might like to know that we are within two hours of the Alnitak system. So far we seem to be alone; there are no ships on long-range sensors."

"Great, thanks Doc." Tom got up and stretched, wincing a little at the cracking sound his spine made when he gave it a few tentative twists. He clapped the EMH on the shoulder in silent thanks for taking a full watch, went over to the replicator and ordered a double raktajino with extra milk.

"Breakfast," he said to the EMH, when the latter raised an eyebrow and clenched his jaw in silent disapproval. "Caffeine for the brain, protein to keep me going, and calcium goodness for my aging bones."

The Doctor snorted. "I will never understand the need in you organics for artificial stimulants. Myself, I'm as fresh as a daisy, just as soon as I'm activated."

Tom took a sip of his raktajino and closed his eyes in momentary bliss. "Me too, but _this_," he waved his cup, "is what Irequire to be activated. That, a trip to the head and a sonic shower." He turned his head towards the main cabin.

"Computer, daytime illumination. Rise and shine, folks! We've got work to do. Time waits for no sentient being."

He made his move for the facilities before the other officers had finished opening their eyes; there were, after all, certain benefits in using your personal vessel for official business – not to mention being the boss.

Nicoletti emerged from the aft bunk looking a little rumpled, but all things considered much better than she had a few hours earlier. She watched Schmidt do push-ups on the floor with a slightly incredulous expression. "Jocks," she mumbled contemptuously, but nonetheless slid her eyes over the Ensign's rippling shoulder muscles with something close to appreciation. Her tongue ever-so-briefly and unconsciously touched her lips.

Coulthard was the last to give signs of life, but when he did so, proved to be one of those obnoxiously cheerful morning persons that made Tom swear silently to avoid long away missions with the man in the future.

It did not take long for everyone to be at their stations cleaned, watered and fed, and fully immersed in their professional personas - focused and sharp. The Alnitak belt was still several parsecs away, but given its sheer volume, the sooner they could narrow their search the better.

"Coulthard, check for residual warp signatures. Schmidt, scan for standard alloys used in construction of docking port and surface installations," Tom requested. "My assumption is that if there is anything in the Belt, it'll be a temporary storage facility or a way station. Some place where cargo ships drop off and pick up whatever it is they're carrying, to break up the runs between Rigel, Betelgeuse and the rest of Federation space."

"And Bellatrix – Orion III," the Doctor added, unnecessarily.

Coulthard couldn't help asking. "Why would they do that? Why not go all the way?"

"If this were an ordinary trading station, I'd say to facilitate the use of short-haul ships and short-haul crews," Tom responded. "Since it isn't, my guess would be plausible deniability, untraceability of cargo manifests and origin. The more stops along the way, the easier it is to create distribution chains with cells that don't know each other. Like money laundering, only with stuff."

"Or people," Nicoletti whispered.

"Yeah. Or people."

"I think I got something, sir," Schmidt announced about an hour into the uncomfortable silence that had followed the last exchange. "Concentration of duranium and tritanium, on a B-class asteroid, size approximating Vesta in the Sol system. Atmosphere present, but not breathable without o-tank supplement. Transmitting coordinates to helm for warp signature check."

Coulthard entered a few additional commands and turned to Tom, frowning. "Unable to detect warp signatures of any kind, sir."

"There aren't any, or you can't detect them?"

"The latter, I think. The outer part of the asteroid belt is rich in neurogenic particles that have failed to cohere into solid matter when the planetoids were formed. Any warp trails would be dispersed within minutes."

"Like a twig you use to erase footprints in the sand," Schmidt stroked his chin thoughtfully. "No wonder these guys like it here, you can't track 'em in. You have to know they're here already, if you want to find them. Good thing for us, you can't hide basic molecular structures."

"Unless you have a cloaking device. Let's hope the Orion Syndicate doesn't establish diplomatic relations with the Romulans."

Tom didn't feel the need to state the obvious – thanks to the conditions in the belt, if they found the right hole to hide in, the Flyer's warp trail would be masked as well, and no one would be the wiser for their arrival.

"Good work, guys," he said grimly. "Schmidt, send the coordinates of the suspected base to Voyager. And to Starfleet, in case they do manage to send us reinforcements. Sue, set up engines for silent running, and give us as much shielding as you can get away with. Try to alternate phase alignment on a random basis." _Should have kept some of those miniature cloaking satellites we picked up with the Enterprise …_

Tom focused on his console again, to try and find a plausible hiding spot for the Flyer where they could await the arrival of the Rigellian (with Voyager in hot pursuit, he hoped). A million klicks away should do it, with an approach that would keep the Flyer in the shadow of other asteroids to the extent possible.

"I'd like to do a bit of a recce _before_ company gets here – establish whether there's a permanent presence there, and if so, how many. Paul, once we're actually inside the belt, slow to one half impulse and try not to hit anything."

He might as well have said 'Battle stations," given the intensity that settled back over the occupants of the cabin. Even the EMH was unusually silent, despite the fact that for the moment he had really nothing to do. His earlier complaints, that his intention in joining the Voyager crew had actually been to advance his service to medicine, had earned him nothing but a largely unapologetic _sorry_ from Tom, and the offer to take him offline for a while.

Bored, he started pacing, and Tom renewed the suggestion.

"No thank you, Mr. Paris. I wouldn't want to miss all the excitement. Besides, I want to ensure I'm properly consulted this time _before_ you come up with any other unorthodox uses for my holographic matrix."

Tom smiled a little ruefully. "Touché, as Picard would say. But you told us many times that you were programmed to be heroic when the need arises, _and_ you were always keen on expanding your horizons. So can you really blame me?"

His attention was drawn away from the Doctor and he was rendered suddenly breathless, by the sight of the asteroid belt now in full view on the screen before them. Even the EMH was moved to utter a disbelieving "Oh, my word!"

Dozens, hundreds, thousands of pieces of stellar flotsam, some barely larger than rocks, others large enough to be considered planetoids. They had hung in this space for billions of years - a curtain drawn across the vastness of space, in silent protest against the void. Jagged and broken, they were the collateral damage of the failure of Alnitak's three suns' to achieve sufficient stability to form proper planets. Drifting alongside each other - sometimes colliding, occasionally pulled out of their orbits and towards a fiery death in one of the three stars - few had ever been blessed with the touch of a foot.

A man could get poetic at a time like this, Tom thought for a moment. Not to mention droolat the piloting challenge… Well, no matter - he needed to focus on finding a suitable hideout for the Flyer.

"Still no traffic on long-range sensors?" he asked Schmidt as he scanned their immediate neighbourhood for possible candidates. Too bad they weren't on Voyager. With access to the Astrometrics lab, not to mention a few minutes of Seven of Nine's time, were she onboard – although Icheb was a close second - this job would have been a cinch.

"None," Schmidt replied. "According to the last transmission from Voyager, they didn't make nearly as good a time through the Flakes as we did; they couldn't cut through the center. So we have to sit here and wait. Unless we take over that base?"

Tom did not miss the hopeful plea in that last query. Arno Schmidt, after a decade of forced idleness in that Romulan prison camp, had energy to burn, and was keen for action – for better or worse. Tom smiled a little.

"Let's not rush into things here, Ensign. Can we see what's there yet?"

"What looks like a Daedalus Class vessel, probably goes with a basic ground crew that keeps the place running. Wonder what they've done to earn _this_ assignment? Nothing else. Wait – there's a bit of a recent warp trail. The neurogenic particles aren't as thick here. Someone's been by not too long ago."

"Biosigns? Sue?"

"Half a dozen, by the looks of it. I can't tell species specifics though. The planetoid has a largely iron ore mantle, and is riddled with caves like a Turkellian cheese. Depending how deep down they've burrowed, I won't be able to read much of anything. We'd have to get a lot closer."

"Riddled with caves, eh." Tom stroked his chin. One shuttle, with crew. One Daedalus Class freighter._ Even odds. _The Rigellian would likely come straight here with their Starfleet hostage, to lie low for a while and figure out next steps.

_What better place to hide out and wait for them, than right in the viper's nest?_

"You sure it's only six, Sue? How reliable are the instruments?"

"For the purposes of detecting life signs, pretty good I'd say."

Tom tugged his lower lip between his teeth for a good minute or two before coming to a conclusion. He turned to his small contingent.

"You guys ready to help the Flyer grab the perfect parking spot?"


	13. Casualties of War

AUTHOR'S NOTE

This chapter contains important plot developments. If you decide to review – and I'm always happy when someone does! – I would be ever so grateful if you could refrain from "spoiler" references, for the benefit of those who like to look at the reviews before reading a story. Cheers!

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 13 – Casualties of War<strong>

"Are you sure that this is a good idea?" the Doctor asked, in his most skeptical voice. "These people down there are certain to have sophisticated defence systems in place. You won't know what kind of booby traps you might run into."

"True," Tom said, "but I was thinking rather along the lines of setting our _own_ booby trap, before we go in." He turned to Nicoletti. "Can you determine where their main environmental systems are? They must be pretty substantial, since they're dependent on them for everything."

Sue clicked away at her console for a few minutes. "Yes, here they are. North-north-west of the main complex, based on local polarity. Round shape, almost cylindrical, with a secondary back-up. Standard small ground station set-up, Rigellian manufacture. Easy to take out, if we need to."

"And there's still only six of them?"

"I checked again, and that's what I get from the station. As I recall, this particular model of station sleeps up to ten in a pinch. There's an outbuilding further away on the south side that's not standard; probably a cargo hold or maintenance port of some sort."

Even if the station did not have its full complement, they could take a maximum of three people down to the station, if they wanted to be able to run the Flyer against the freighter, should that become necessary …

Tom allowed the thought to peter out as he weighed his options, lower lip firmly between his teeth. _One day you're going to chew right through, _B'Elanna was fond of teasing him about his favourite thinking mode. He hadn't yet, but he was coming close this time around; the coppery taste of his own blood brought him back to the now – and a decision.

"Doc. Remember your first – or was it your third? – time as a reluctant commando? When we sent you to the Alpha Quadrant, and you took out those Romulans with a couple of canisters of – what was that? Neurazine?"

The Doctor drew a deep breath, and grew a few centimeters in blissful memory.

"How could I forget! That was the moment when, thanks to my superb efforts, Voyager _finally_ managed to advise Starfleet that we were merely lost, not dead." The EMH basked just a little in the achievement.

"The first time I met your father, Mr. Paris, an encounter that no doubt was instrumental to convincing him that holograms …" He stopped when he felt Tom's glare on him, hot enough to melt down his chatterbox subroutine on contact. "And yes, it was Neurazine. Sorry."

Tom sighed. It was disconcerting just how much he and the Doctor were alike in some ways. Neither of them had ever fundamentally understood, let alone mastered, the concept of shutting up – the difference between them was merely a matter of subject matter and nuance, when you thought about it. No wonder they bugged each other so much, and got along so well …

"How much would we need to disburse through the whole station, and how long would it take before we can be confident that it's taken effect?"

The Doctor walked over to Nicoletti's console, and absorbed the slightly fuzzy image of the tritanium construction on the planetoid. She showed him the estimated volume of the station. "Four canisters should do it. Without knowing how fast the air circulation is in a system like that …"

"Half-hour tact," Nicoletti tossed over her shoulder. "If it's standard."

"Fine, I would give it forty-five minutes then."

"And another forty-five to clear, I assume, so when we go in to pick up the pieces we'll need to wear breathing gear inside for the first hour or so."

Chemical warfare as a concept had never sat cleanly with Tom Paris, but he was prepared to make a moral distinction between knocking someone out temporarily so as to spare possibly greater injury, and asphyxiating them with a view to causing death or permanent incapacity.

Then again …

"Doctor?"

The EMH gave a great sigh and cast his eyes heavenward. "I was wondering how long it would be before you'd ask."

Tom grinned, taking the response for resignation, if not consent. "Thanks. We want to make sure no one down there suffers lasting harm. If they're involved in slavery, I'd like to see them live out a long and healthy life in a penal colony somewhere. Plus, your coming instead of Coulthard will free him up to put the Flyer down in one of those crevices. Think you can handle that, Paul?"

He smiled at the junior pilot. The previous day had improved the young man's confidence to the point where he was prepared to nod; the Captain's apparent readiness to remind him of the previous day's piloting cameraderie eliminated any residual hesitation.

"Yes, sir!"

"Good. I thought so." Coulthard visibly basked in the implicit recognition, and surreptitiously looked around the room whether any of the others had caught it. Schmidt winked at him rather ostentatiously, and the younger man blushed a little.

"Will transporters work through the particle soup out there, Sue?"

Nicoletti punched in a few more commands and nodded. "Transporters are unaffected."

"That's unusually good news. What were the odds for that…? Never mind - I'll take it. Let's do it then, folks."

The Doctor used his medical codes to replicate the chemical, while Nicoletti determined the best location within the environmental system into which to transport the four cylinders. Programmed to open a few minutes after transport, they would release their contents into the ventilation system, from which it would spread through the station.

Half an hour later, the two human officers donned their breathing apparatus – the Doctor making the occasional unfunny remark about the general inadequacy and inefficiency of organics as they did so - and prepared for transport.

"Are the bio signs stationary?"

"No movement in the last five minutes," Nicoletti confirmed. "All strong, though. I've got the spot where most of them are located."

"Schmidt, you got the restraints?"

Much as Tom hated to have to rely on mechanical means to prevent putative captives from escaping, the Flyer's limited capacity didn't permit them to be brought aboard. They would have to be held on the ground until Voyager and its brig arrived on the scene, and Tom did not want to waste time setting up containment fields in an unknown operational environment. Sometimes the old-fashioned way of immobilizing adversaries was still the best …

"Aye, sir."

"Right." There was really not much more to say.

"Three to beam down."

…..

They materialized in a room roughly the size of the Flyer's cabin, and configured as a small lounge. Several armchairs were arranged in a semi-circle before a holovid projection stage, on which three Orion women without much in the way of clothing were gyrating lasciviously to the pulsating beat of a generic soundtrack. Schmidt's eyes widened, but he made no protest when Tom shut off the transmission.

It was clearly the station's entertainment and rec center; describing it as 'grotty' would have been an understatement, and Tom was uncharacteristically grateful for his well-filtered artificial air supply. The room's occupants, two Rigellians and one Narovian, all male, lay passed out on three of the chairs. The Narovian had been holding a glass, the contents of which had spilled all over his chest; one of the Rigellians had obviously been appreciating the show on a rather deep and personal level, and been knocked out in a state that made Tom glad that Nicoletti had stayed on the ship.

"Restraints on ankles and wrists; leave them on the chairs. May as well keep 'em comfortable," he ordered curtly. "And cover that guy up. No point in public humiliation."

He cast another long look over the three figures. _Organized Crime – ah, the glamour of it all. _There used to be a time when people thought criminal operatives were cool, interesting and worthy of attention, even surreptitious admiration. The twentieth century movie library contained countless so-called gangster films, and B'Elanna, while looking to augment the library for the little TV she had built him, had once even come across a whole television serial featuring criminals as the heroes. Having spent more time than he cared to think about in the company of the real thing at Auckland, Tom had failed to see the allure and never bothered with any of those shows. The sight of the creatures before him confirmed to him that he'd been right.

The Doctor ran his tricorder over the three men, and nodded. "All in fine health. They'll wake up in about half an hour."

Nicoletti provided the away team with the coordinates for the bio signs of the remaining three men, and they soon joined their colleagues in the screening room, equally secured if less comfortably seated.

"Just in case, Doc, we should do a careful scan from down here, in case Sue's instruments missed something." Tom called up the station's internal schematic on one of the consoles in its small ops centre, and all three members of the away team spent the next thirty minutes or so carefully scanning all recorded apertures and potential hiding places for additional life signs. None were found.

"Well, that was kinda … anti-climactic," Schmidt observed, when the away team had assembled in the ops centre. The EMH had given the environmental _all clear_, and both humans disconnected their breathing apparatus with considerable relief.

"What did you expect, Ensign, fireworks? A six-headed hydra? I for one am happy that my neurazine treatment was as effective this time as it was the last," the Doctor replied.

"It's amazing, when you drill down into the world of organized crime, what you get is essentially just different qualities of lowlife," Tom mused. "Some move in the most select circles, look like successful businessmen, and fly their own personal mahogany-clad shuttlecraft. Some are vicious thugs, in it for some kind of visceral gratification. Most, I think, are gormless sleazebags like Mr. Happy Times there, who just run along for the money. But at the end of the day, they're all the same – creeps with the decency chip missing. The only difference is, the guys in the suits are a damn sight harder to catch. Even if they trip up, they can usually buy their way out of trouble."

Schmidt snorted. "Ain't that the truth," he muttered. Nearly a year on, and the trial of the politicians whose corrupt practices had led to untold misery in the DMZ and the creation of a secret Romulan prison camp where he had lost a decade of his life, was mired in legal wrangling, and the two main protagonists were out on bail. One even had briefly tried to revive his political career and had a vocal, if small, following … "Sometimes I wonder why we bother trying to fight these guys."

Tom shrugged. "We do what we can," he said. "Step by little step. We have to. I mean, you've seen what they did to those women. People who work with the Syndicate just don't give a shit about what they do to people in their quest for profit. And if we don't, who will? We can't afford to cave just because we may not get results fast enough, or win every battle. We have a responsibility to people who can do nothing, to do something. And as Lemarr would tell you, acceptance is surrender."

…..

"Lieutenant, I am detecting a series of objects in subspace!" Icheb's voice was a mixture of surprise and indignation. "I cannot tell what it is, but …"

With a sudden _vrroompff_, the ship was shaken hard, and Baytart had to hold on to his console to avoid being flung out of his seat.

"What the hell was that?" he snarled, as his fingers started to play the conn like a piano, trying to stabilize the ship. "We're losing the warp field!"

"Try keeping the field intact," Asil ordered – rather unnecessarily, the pilot thought a little sourly, talk about stating the obvious - just as a second pounding shook the bridge. Then a third.

"Subspace mines, sir," Icheb announced. "Most likely from the freighter. The ablative armour has prevented any fissures in the hull, but the concussive effect has caused some casualties in Engineering. Main deflectors are off line; we won't be able to maintain the shield oscillation. We'll be visible to them again in three … two … one seconds."

"I think they already knew we were there," Ayala observed from Tactical. "Those mines … that was no coincidence. They were laid just for us. I don't know how, but they knew."

"Maybe somebody told them about our little trick?' Baytart's hands had not stopped moving, but now he slapped them on the console in frustration.

"Sorry, sir. I lost the warp field. They're gone."

Asil's eyes momentarily stared off into the distance, looking for answers and solutions that would not come, even to her Vulcan logic. "Bridge to Engineering. How long before you can get the warp drive back online?"

"Torres here. We've lost the secondary coupling in the matter-antimatter chamber when that console went down. It's not critical, but we'll need at least twenty minutes., especially with three of my people out And I heard Baytart. I agree – they must have known we were still on their tail."

Asil looked at Ayala, raising an eyebrow in unspoken question.

"No transmissions off this ship since last night," the security officer confirmed after a quick check. "I don't know how they might have gotten this information, unless …" He swallowed, hard, when it hit him.

"_Commander Tervellyan_. Tom … the Captain told me that Maquis tactics and some of the things we came up with in the DQ were extremely popular in tactical seminars when he was at the Kirk Centre."

Ayala couldn't quite bring himself to finish the sentence, as two possible scenarios seared his mind, equally devastating: either the Commander had given the information voluntarily, which made him the traitor they had been trying to find, or it had been … extracted. Having met a number of survivors of Cardassian interrogation techniques, Mike Ayala was only too aware of the many ways in which even the strongest individual could be broken.

Asil stood still for a moment, the same considerations having been considered in her well-ordered mind, and assigned their relative priority. "For the time being, it is irrelevant how or why the freighter was able to detect us. The fact is that it has, and we are presently not in a position to continue our pursuit. Please inform Captain Paris that The Flyer is on her own for the time being. We will get to Alnitak as soon as we can, assuming that is where the Rigellian is headed, but we will be behind schedule."

…..

"Flyer to away team, incoming. Five billion klicks." Coulthard's voice crackled over the station's comm system which Nicoletti had managed to link up with the shuttle's. "Whorfin class freighter, by what I can read of its signature through this soup."

"How many onboard?" Voyager's delay had been unwelcome news on principle, but the idea of facing the Rigellian ship and her crew with only the Flyer's small complement did not appeal to Tom's sense of what constituted decent odds. At least they would have the element of surprise on their side, even if one half of the pincer he'd hoped to deploy would be missing.

"Thirteen, sir," Nicoletti confirmed. "Looks like the original crew, plus three others. My guess is that they took on a couple of people from _that other freighter_."

Naming the ship of death would, Tom speculated briefly, be forever more an exercise in euphemisms for all who had been there. _That other freighter _would have to do for the moment …

He could hear Nicoletti's fingers click over her instruments. "Total of five Orion, four Narovians, three Rigellian and … one human." She swallowed audibly, and her voice shook a little.

"Captain … Tom? The human life signs … they're failing."

…..

Tom cursed under his breath as complete silence descended over the station's grimy operations centre. He closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them again, their normally warm blue had turned to grey ice.

"Doctor, I'm afraid you'll have to revert to your Narovian personality. Pretend you're one of the ground crew but don't let them come into port. I want them somewhere the Flyer can fire on them freely, if needed. Tell them there's a technical problem down here – say, a recent asteroid strike took out the guidance system, and we're working on it."

Schmidt was already on his way to the Doctor to reset his emitter; there was no time to lose. He held out his arm for the ensign with an air of pained resignation.

"Coulthard, prepare to come out of hiding on my mark, or if they give any sign of getting ready to take off. Target their propulsion systems at first go; we can't afford to let them get away. Since theirs isn't a battleship I assume the mines they got Voyager with came out of a cargo bay. Who knows what else they've got in there, but whatever it is, hit it and hit it hard."

Coulthard's jaw ground a little; hesitantly, he ventured, "But … sir, won't you … won't you be _on board _if I fire?"

Tom shrugged. "I've been on a ship that's been hit more times than you can shake a stick at, Ensign. The key is to hold onto something when it happens. We'll be fine, just as long as you don't haul out any disruptors."

Seeing that Coulthard did not seem mollified, he added, "And I promise we'll stay out of that cargo bay."

…..

The Doctor's performance was up there with his finest renditions of _Nessun Dorma – _every note in place, with just the right amount of emotion. His particular brand of reflexive annoyance was well suited to the bored ground crew attendant, who had been hauled off a good holovid to look after unwelcome guests.

The story about the asteroid strike was accepted without much question; in an environment such as this it was more than plausible. If the freighter crew found the change in arrangement peculiar, they gave no sign of it. Minutes later, the freighter confirmed its position in a geostationary orbit around the planetoid.

Tom paused for breath, for the very briefest of moments, B'Elanna's words ringing in his ears. _Don't be too much of a hero. _He was a father now …

But there was no question as to what he would do. What he had to do, as Captain of Voyager. Hell, what _Tom Paris_ needed to do.

"We'll use the station's transporter to get the two of us …" Schmidt was already unholstering his phaser, checking the charge. Tom looked at the EMH, who nodded grimly.

_Life signs are failing …_

"… Get the _three_ of us onboard that freighter, as soon as they've landed."

"Aye, sir."

…..

Schmidt materialized in the freighter's engine room, where three of the crew were found, phaser in hand. He fired without hesitation, just as soon as he had acquired molecular cohesion, taking merciless advantage of the fact that his arrival came without warning. His shots were none too fast; no point in missing thanks to undue haste. His cool, methodical approach paid off; one by one the freighter's engineering crew fell where they had stood. None even had the time to raise an intruder alert.

He paused for a second, rather pleased with himself, before comming his success to his shipmates. _Not bad, for a first combat scenario in over a decade … _

"Engineering secured. Should I head out to look for more?"

"Hold until further notice," Tom Paris' voice was slightly strained. The whirr of intense phaser fire was audible in the background before he gave a quick curse and cut the line.

Schmidt hesitated only for a split second. _His Captain … the man who had saved his life … under fire on the bridge. _He headed down the corridor, weapon in hand.

The shot that felled him came from a door he had just passed; he had no time to curse his own stupidity for proceeding without pre-scanning the way ahead with his tricorder – not to mention against the Captain's orders - before the blackness took him.

….

Tom and the Doctor had beamed straight onto the bridge, where the most resistance could be expected. Its four occupants were as surprised by their sudden appearance as the engine crew had been by Schmidt's, but a bit speedier in their reactions. Two of them managed to pull out their phasers before they were shot.

With an air of bored nonchalance, the EMH, who had not bothered seeking cover, drew what fire the two crewmembers managed to get off. Tom was able to pick them off relatively easily, from his shelter behind the ops console, only briefly interrupted by Schmidt's status report and his own response.

As soon as all four were down, Tom tapped his comm badge. _Five to go. _Plus his First Officer.

"Sue, lock onto me and the Doc and transport us straight to where you found Jarod's bio signs."

"Aye, sir. It appears Ensign Schmidt is down though. I can't raise him, and his life signs are weakening …"

A moment's hesitation, no more, and the decision he knew he must make. "Damn. Send the Doc to him. Me to the Commander. _Now._"

"Aye sir. There are two others in that room… but the Commander …"

The rest of her words were lost in the tingle of the transporter, and just for one moment longer Tom was able to deny what, deep down, he knew would be.

"… the Commander is gone."

…..

The room where he materialized was unremarkable, the Master's office by the look of it. It was blandly furnished but spacious and well-appointed, indicative of the ship's success at business. A Rigellian - its owner, judging by the expensive cut of his clothes - sat hunched forward on the couch in a corner, arms crossed in a half-defensive posture over his considerable bulk, as if warding off some potential peril to himself. But his eyes were alight with something akin to … need, almost desire, and there was a drop of spittle in the corner of his mouth.

The scene that had been mesmerizing this evident connoisseur of the macabre would be burned forever into Tom Paris' mind: An Orion woman, lithe and beautiful in the way of a deadly snake, was standing over the sprawled – no, spread-eagled - body of his First Officer. All four of his limbs, stretched out from his body as if in mute supplication, bore the mark of a single phaser blast, one on each hand and foot. The weapon in her hand was still pointing at the small of Tervellyan's back, where three charred holes had formed a hideous line. The central shot was located in the middle of Tervellyan's spine; the killing blast. His blistered skin was still steaming.

The woman whipped around when she heard the transporter's tell-tale tingle, and her phaser pivoted in Tom's direction. He fired before she had completed the motion, and the weapon rocketed out of her hand. She hissed out a curse and instinctively grabbed the paralyzed hand with the other.

The Rigellian uncrossed his arms, as if about to reach for a weapon of his own, even as he made a guttural sound of surprise. Even if his entrepreneurial success had made him fat, he had apparently not lost the fighting instincts that had gotten him where he was.

"Don't you fucking move," Tom spat. "I have time to get off two shots, even if she shoots me. And this phaser is set to kill." _A lie, but they couldn't know that_ … he hoped.

The Rigellian stilled, his eyes calculating.

"Captain Paris, I presume?" The woman's sibilant voice was almost a caress. She did not seem surprised, nor particularly perturbed, by his sudden arrival. Here voice did not betray the pain of her injury, and there was a cold serenity about her that Tom found deeply disturbing. "What a … surprise. You have proven most inconvenient. We thought we had managed to get rid of you and your pesky ship."

"Well, sorry to disappoint you," he ground out. "You two can consider yourselves under provisional arrest for kidnapping and murdering a Starfleet Officer, and for conspiracy to enslave sentient beings and to deprive a civilian population of medication needed for their survival."

Whatever else Tom's views on his captives' position was, it remained unarticulated, as the door to the Master's room whooshed open and two men burst in, another Rigellian and one Orion. They started firing almost immediately and it was only the fact that the Orion woman stood between them and their intended target that caused one of them to miss entirely, and the other to merely hit Tom's left shoulder.

He returned fire, unheeding of the still unarmed woman, but dimly aware that the Rigellian on the couch had successfully drawn his own weapon. Ignoring the searing pain in his shoulder, Tom dove for cover behind the closest piece of furniture, a desk. He had almost made it when he felt another stabbing pain, in his left calf this time.

_Four against one. Lousy odds,_ he thought even as he got off a shot that hit the freighter's master squarely in the chest and knocked him into the wall. The man slumped and lay still.

_Three._

Tom fired again, over the head of the Orion woman who, despite being in the crossfire, was bending down to reach for her weapon with her uninjured hand. He missed when the pain in his shoulder caused his body to spasm, and the blast from his phaser glanced harmlessly off the doorframe.

To Tom's surprise, the man collapsed anyway, followed by the other in short order. _Schmidt was down and the Doc was still in Narovian mode._ _Had Coulthard ignored his orders to stay with the Flyer?_

Refusing to be distracted by the mystery of who might have come to his aid in such a timely manner, he gave another shot with his phaser, this time aiming for the Orion woman, who had palmed her weapon again. She spat out another curse and fell on her knees, both hands dangling uselessly now, the left twitching a little. Tom found himself taking a vicious satisfaction in her incapacitation, even as his own leg and shoulder started to throb mercilessly.

The weapon had clattered out of the woman's hand and slid across the floor. It stopped at the feet of a man in Starfleet uniform, now standing beside the body of Jarod Tervellyan. Tom blinked, trying to focus through the red curtain before his eyes. _ Who_…?

"Whatever happened to the buddy system, Tom? Going into this kind of situation by yourself is not the smartest thing, you know. And B'Elanna's going to be totally pissed at you for getting hurt again."

"Harry?" he managed to croak out, as the familiar voice filtered into his pain-fogged brain. He pulled himself upright with the assistance of the desk he had tried to shelter behind. "What the hell …"

"And hello to you, too. Buster Kincaid, at your service,_ Captain_. " Although he could not resist saying the words he had been saving up for just such a moment for years, Lieutenant Commander Harry Kim's voice was grim. The sight of the dead officer on the floor, only now taken in fully, had evaporated whatever drop of humour he might have found in the situation at another time.

"We were taking some senior Federation types to Rigel when the orders came in from Headquarters to back you up at Alnitak. We went into the belt with shuttles; it's too dense for the Enterprise. We contacted your Flyer and they told us where you were, so six of us beamed over here to lend a hand and mop up. Looks like we made it just in time. So who's this?"

His weapon pointed at the woman who was kneeling on the floor, her face tight with pain from Tom's phaser blasts, but betraying no emotion – and certainly no fear. She stared at them in silence, her yellow eyes cold and unblinking as a snake's.

"I believe she's some kind of kingpin in the Orion Crime Syndicate, who was originally on her way to the Narov system. She was onboard that abandoned freighter we found with the dead women in the cargo hold. Then, after she got picked up by this freighter and taken to Kalpak Station, it seems she holed up with what appeared to be their senior operative there for a bit before – apparently - hitching a ride back on this ship. Maybe things got too hot for her on Kalpak, what with us sniffing around."

Tom had managed to stand but he was leaning heavily against the desk for a moment, favouring his injured leg, before limping over to the prone form of his First Officer. Knowing the answer he would get, but refusing to acknowledge it quite yet, he ran his tricorder over Tervellyan's body. Expelling a breath, he snapped the device shut.

He turned to the Orion woman, cold fury breaking his voice into shards of ice.

"Why did you kill him? And why like that? Did you enjoy … playing with him before you killed him? Showing off your … skills to that Rigellian sleaze?"

A disdainful smile slid across the woman's face. It failed to reach her eyes, those very cold, very old eyes that may have belonged to someone who had chosen to turn whatever pain she had known outward, and to pay it back a thousand times.

"He made his own destiny."

Her tongue moved inside her cheek as if searching for something. Another smile curdled her once beautiful lips into a grimace of contemptuous triumph, as she bit down and swallowed.

"What the…" Harry exclaimed as she collapsed. Her body convulsed a few times and stilled, her final words a chill breath in the room.

"Failure has its price."

…..

Tom cursed and stepped forward, having momentarily forgotten about his injured leg. It gave way and he fell on his knee.

"Careful, Tom." Harry grabbed him under the arms, careful of his injured shoulder, and pulled him into a sitting position against the console. "Why don't you just sit down and rest until we get the Doc to have a look at you. I'm sorry I don't have a hypospray for the pain."

Harry walked over to the woman, ran his own tricorder over her and shook his head. "She's dead," he confirmed. "Some kind of poison, I guess." He tapped his comm badge.

"Kim to away team. Is the freighter secure?"

"Aye sir," came the response from a voice Tom vaguely recognized as one of the Enterprise's junior security officers. "We found one more hiding in the crew's quarters, and a Narovian who says he is Starfleet. He was with an injured crewman from Voyager, probably ready to finish the job although he _claims_ he's a doctor. He is … quite agitated, sir. O'Connor tried to sedate him but it isn't working."

Tom tapped his badge in turn, wincing a little with the effort. "This is Captain Tom Paris, USS Voyager. Thanks for your help, Enterprise team. That Narovian is our EMH. You should remember him from the Trifid, we've just had to disguise him a little. Have him make sure that Schmidt is okay and when he's done, I wouldn't mind letting him have a look at me."

He signed off, his eyes drawn again to the body of his First Officer - the splayed arms and legs, the burn marks on his hands and feet, the row of three more blackened points drawn across his waist ...

And then the truth of what he was seeing struck him, as sharp as a knife and as bitter as anything he had ever tasted.

"Orion," he said tonelessly. "That's _Orion_. He wasn't just killed for breaking into Krall's lair, Harry. He was _executed_. Do you see? It's the Syndicate's … special code of honour, or what passes as that. The price of betrayal by one of their own. _He made his own destiny, _she said."

Harry swallowed as he, too, now recognized in that callous, horrific display of Jarod Tervellyan's body the outline of the constellation as it showed so brightly in the winter skies of Earth.

The sign of the Hunter. Shadows and secrets. Desire and ambition.

And always, always, death without mercy.

By the First Officer's right hand – beside the mark that would be Bellatrix - lay the phaser that had killed him so, so slowly, ritually, making its statement point by blackened point. The weapon whose owner would, with a wave of her hand, order the death of innocents as easily as she had administered punishment to one she considered her own.

With the wave of this weapon and others like it, coldly wielded in the name of profit and ambition, an entire Star system had been held hostage to disease and might yet be brought to its knees.

The key to power in a twisted world.


	14. Ghosts

**Chapter 14 – Ghosts**

Voyager's briefing room was more crowded than usual, with three of the Enterprise's senior staff having beamed over for an after-action conference or, in the language of Earth's old navies, the "hot wash-up". Captain William Riker, his wife and Counselor, Deanna Troi, and Harry Kim had beamed over from the Enterprise to join with Tom, Asil, B'Elanna, Ayala, the Doctor and Baytart, taking advantage of the two ships hanging in space side by side.

The Doctor was his usual self again, having gotten the last of the Narovian kinks out of his system by excoriating Tom for his lack of caution and his propensity for getting himself damaged, and complaining about his treatment by the Enterprise's away team. The hapless recipient of his tirade had only been relieved by the timely arrival of his daughter, hand in hand with her mother, Toby the Targ in tow. Miral's excited report that she could see the Enterprise through her bedroom window and would be visiting with her friends for a bit effectively wrecked the Doctor's sour mood, and he was smiling by the time he watched her hugging her 'idiot' Daddy.

B'Elanna, for her part, had said little in Sickbay, but briefly touched her forehead to Tom's before helping him off the biobed. Words were not always needed, and there would be time to talk, later. Including, he suspected, about the wisdom about transporting alone into a room full of armed criminals.

The EMH's had made his usual p_ro forma_ protest at the speed with which his patient insisted on leaving Sickbay, knowing they would be ignored and contenting himself with a mere disapproving glare as he looked around the briefing room. Riker declined Tom's offer to let him, as the most senior officer onboard, have the head of the table. "_Your_ ship," he said with a wolfish grin as he lowered his considerable bulk into the chair normally reserved for the First Officer. "Don't ever forget that, _Captain _Paris."

Upon entering the familiar space, Harry's feet automatically carried him to the seat he had occupied for seven years, a move that brought a fleeting smile to B'Elanna's eyes and a raised eyebrow from Asil, who normally sat there now. She silently took another seat, logic indicating that a chair was, after all, just a chair.

Troi kept shooting not-so-surreptitious glances in Tom's direction, which he studiously ignored. Maybe at some point down the road he might be willing to talk to her, but not now. Not yet.

Starfleet operations in the Narov system were almost complete, and the progress reports from Headquarters were promising. The USS Roddenberry had intercepted a shuttle on course from Kalpak Station, carrying one Darmoth Krall – unfortunately for him, his vessel had strayed into Federation space, and he would soon find himself before a court on a multiplicity of charges.

While no one was under any illusion that all of the Syndicate's agents in the Snowflakes had been flushed out, Nacheyev's orders to ignore the quarantine and beam personnel onto the surface unannounced to seize those they could locate had netted enough operatives to disrupt its operations for the foreseeable future. The protests from the authorities about violation of Narovian sovereignty and space had faded quickly when the Federation followed its unilateral actions with more medical supplies, properly distributed this time. Starfleet had also turned the suspects over to the local justice system, together with all relevant evidence, a move that went a long way to smooth things over.

But the diplomatic fallout would no doubt continue, including on Rigel, where some serious internal house-cleaning would need to be done on an urgent basis. The Enterprises mission to that system had acquired a sudden urgency and new sense of purpose, and Riker was eager to get going.

But first things first.

The mood around the table was generally somber, although Tom's description of the Doctor's escape from Kalpak provided a brief moment of levity. There were still questions, the obvious one – the precise nature and extent of Jarod Tervellyan's involvement with the Orion Crime Syndicate – being the elephant in the room no one wanted to touch, at least for now. By silent agreement, they stuck to other things, and the discussion ranged freely.

"Why would the freighter go back to Alnitak, though?" B'Elanna's voice betrayed her puzzlement. "I mean, if that woman wanted to get away, she could presumably have made them head straight for Orion, once they got out of that Snowflake mess."

"Didn't you say that asteroid was a way station, Tom?" Harry asked. "Maybe they were going to drop that … Syndicate officer off, to be picked up by someone else."

"Possibly. But why use a freighter for that? Surely there were other, faster ships on Kalpak that she could have commandeered."

"Maybe the freighter was coming back here anyway? They'd gotten rid of most of the medication they picked up from us on Nemoth II, and when we took the rest, they'd have been ready to pick up new … cargo. They're into profit," Ayala opined, "so why waste an extra trip?"

Tom inclined his head. "True. Coulthard detected some relatively recent, undecayed warp trails around the asteroid. They did have what looked like a cargo section off to the side of the station."

Something in his own words struck him then, like a direct punch to the gut. His mouth opened slightly and his face turned ashen. Troi's head shot up from whatever blast of emotion she was receiving from him even as Tom hit his comm badge.

"Paris to Nicoletti and Coulthard. Either of you guys ever check that cargo facility beside the station … for bio signs? Or did you just check the station?"

The two-fold 'no' – gasping from Nicoletti, drawn out from Coulthard as they realized why he was asking - echoed around the suddenly silent briefing table. Ayala was already out of his seat.

"I'll go?"

Tom nodded his consent. "Take Coulthard. He's familiar with the asteroids surrounding the station." Tom's voice was raw, and Deanna Troi gave him a concerned look.

"You couldn't have known," her eyes whispered to him.

"I should have thought to check," his own, suddenly dark, answered back.

With but a breath, she said, out loud, "There's time. It will be fine."

Riker had followed the exchange with interest. His wife had mentioned to him several times that for a person who could be so closed off to others, Tom Paris seemed to be able to communicate extremely effectively with her, without words. Perhaps he had some latent empathic abilities? It would certainly explain his susceptibility to certain forms of alien mental manipulation in the past. No matter.

"I'll put our two Flyers on standby, in case you need … transportation space. Assuming your team finds what you seem to think they will. Deanna …?"

She nodded, and Tom shot both her and Riker a grateful look. If his gut was correct and the 'cargo' the Rigellian may have come to pick up when dropping off Tervellyan's murderer were more Orion slaves, the counselor's presence would be invaluable.

Riker issued brief orders to Jorak, who was holding the bridge on the Enterprise, and added, "Even if you don't find what you think may be there, it'll be interesting to see what kind of goods they're dealing with out here, beside slaves and medication."

With a new tasking already underway, the wrap-up session came to a quick end. Will Riker stayed behind, though, motioning Harry and Deanna to give him some private time with his former Number One.

"Finding a good First Officer isn't easy," he said, almost conversationally.

Tom let out a breath, unsure of what to say, or where this was headed. He came back with a tentative, "You're not kidding."

"Ultimately it's a matter of trust," Riker continued. "And I've found that when it comes to my senior staff, I can't trust anyone they just _give_ me. I have to meet them for myself, get a feel. I mean, would you have picked Tervellyan, if you'd had the choice?"

Tom chewed on that thought, as he had over the last few hours - the last couple of days, if he were honest with himself.

"I was happy enough when Nacheyev assigned him; at least I knew the guy. Or thought I did. But …" He was fishing for the right words. "If I'd had a choice, I probably would have picked someone else. B'Elanna didn't take to him at all, and her instincts are as good as mine, if not better."

He sighed. "I guess you're right, Will. When it comes to finding someone who you can _always _turn your back on, or whom would hand your child to in a crisis … I'm not sure anyone can do that _for_ you. You're lucky they let you have Jorak."

"And you, before that," Riker said, almost gently. Tom shot him a surprised but grateful look. "Who _would_ you have picked, if they'd let you?"

Tom couldn't help letting a little bitterness creep into his voice. "You _know_ who, Will. I asked you before, and you turned me down flat. Something about _over your_ _decomposing corpse_, as I recall. So I didn't bother to pursue it with Starfleet. I even found myself a good rationalization as to why we'd be better off serving on different ships for a while."

Riker stilled for a moment, one part of him not really wanting to say what his conscience dictated. He had been serious when he had told Tom – and Starfleet – that he would not accept any further poaching of his senior staff, after losing Tom and B'Elanna in one fell swoop. But now …

"Given the smell in the air, you may want to ask me again. Of course, I can't vouch for the bureaucrats in personnel letting you have a mere Lieutenant Commander for the job. You'll have to do the convincing yourself. Maybe you could hire that miracle worker that keeps your father in line – what's her name again? Nicole? Scary, that one."

Tom was momentarily speechless, but Riker's rising out of his chair deprived him of the necessity to make an answer. Gratitude was not something Will Riker was fond of accepting – a trait he shared with the man before him.

"Let me know. Meantime, I'll head back to my ship, and get ready to read the Rigellians the riot act about their commercial fleet and some general vigilance issues. I also have to make sure our various guests are properly accommodated in the brig. By the way that was pretty sneaky, Paris, dumping those low lifes on me just because yours is smaller."

"Actually, the reason I stuck you with them is, I'm sentimentally attached to our brig. I won't just let anyone in there," Tom replied, grateful for the ability to return to their normal banter.

Riker snorted and clapped him on the shoulder. "Well, if those shuttles come back with what you think they might, you take the passengers and we have a deal."

…..

The rescue of twelve Orion dancers - frightened, cold and hungry by the time the shuttles reached them - from the asteroid's cargo space, and watching Lemarr Valon introduce them, her voice fearless and clear, to a world in which there were choices, had been a bright, bright light in a day that Tom Paris would otherwise have considered among the darkest he could remember.

_Step by step …_

But now he could no longer postpone what Kathryn Janeway had once told him - quite unnecessarily - would be the hardest thing he would ever have to do as a commanding officer. His face was taut with tension as he entered his ready room, for once not an oasis of calm but a trap, snapping shut.

"Computer, call up personnel file of … Commander Jarod Vazhken Tervellyan." Jarod's face, a small smile creasing the corners of his eyes, filled the screen before him, above the line of biostatistics that made up his basic Starfleet record. Tom took a deep breath.

"Let the record reflect that Commander Tervellyan, First Officer of USS Voyager, passed away earlier this day, Stardate 57836.15." He paused briefly, and resumed.

"He was murdered by a senior member of the Orion Crime Syndicate, who in turn died by her own hand in the presence of Captain Thomas Eugene Paris, USS Voyager and Lieutenant Commander Harry Kim of the USS Enterprise, of a lethal dose of myco-anzid. Details of the … operation that led to these events are reported separately. Computer, close personnel file Jarod Tervellyan, restricted access. Authorization Paris Epsilon-Lambda-Five."

He watched the picture fade out and the file close, superimposed with the "classified" symbol that would ensure that access to Tervellyan's entire personnel record would be limited to Starfleet investigators for the time being.

For a moment, the screen remained dark. Done.

_Another death on his watch. _

Tom blinked in surprise when the screen lit up again, unbidden, flashing a personal message addressed to him, by name and rank. He tapped a command into the console to determine its source, and sucked in a breath when he took in the sender's name.

_Jarod Tervellyan._

It was standard practice for Starfleet personnel to record farewell messages for their loved ones, to be transmitted at confirmation of death. Tom had recorded such a message himself – once in the expectation of his imminent demise, later when he and B'Elanna had started their service on the Enterprise, with Miral onboard. But in both cases, the message was directed at his immediate family, not addressed to his Captain - no matter how close his relationship with Janeway and Riker, respectively.

He frowned a little, not sure how to proceed –whether Starfleet investigators should not be the first to hear it. It did not take him long to decide that he owed his former XO the time to listen, but precautions had to be taken.

"Computer, authenticate recipient - Captain Tom Paris."

"Voice print confirmed. Message standing by."

"Computer, record message."

"Message will be recorded on a secondary channel," the computer's diffidently pleasant voice reassured him.

"Activate." He took a deep breath and sat back in his chair, resisting the instinct to cross his arms protectively before his chest.

Tervellyan's face appeared on the screen, in the clothing he had worn for his and the EMH's away mission on Kalpak. Clearly, the message was new – it had been recorded just before his departure. He looked tired, resigned, the shadows on his face deepened by his deliberate failure to shave that day.

"Captain Paris - Tom. If you are listening to this, I assume they … got me. Inevitable at this stage, I guess. The Syndicate does _not_ take kindly to failure, and I guess the writing was on the wall for me when I didn't – couldn't - warn them about the traceable antigen in time. I did tell them as soon as I found out, of course, but the damage was done."

"Of course, they sold that stuff right out of Starfleet boxes on Kalpak so it isn't like someone there didn't fuck up as well. But I suppose those nanoprobes will make _all_ the other diversions traceable, and useless to them. I think – no, I know – they were counting on me being close enough to you to be in on everything on that mission. Why they asked me to volunteer to be your XO – leaking stuff out of Nacheyev's office was good, but the Snowflakes mattered to them in a big way, and they can always get someone else into Headquarters. Anyway, I guess the factthat I _didn't_, or _couldn't_, tell them about your plans for the meds would have marked me as a failure as a mole. Scared me shitless when I found out you'd done that behind my back."

He looked down at his fingernails briefly. Tom swallowed hard.

_I didn't warn them about the traceable antigen in time._

Tervellyan's image continued, with a short, bitter laugh. "But now I'm about to do something even worse, as far as they're concerned – help _you_ get information on _them_, like you asked. I suppose I should have said no. That's a heck of a lot worse than mere failure."

His eyes darkened momentarily, and Tom knew, without any doubt, that Jarod Tervellyan understood the price he would pay – did pay. _At his Captain's command_.

The recording had gone on, and Tom's conscious mind had to catch up with what his ears had absorbed in its absence.

"You're probably asking what the hell went through my head when I hooked up with them." Tervellyan shook his head, as if trying to clear it of a fog. "Thought I could do this, you know - shoot 'em a bit of information here and there, set myself up for a life after Starfleet. I mean here _you_ were, making money hand over fist from those holovids of yours. And you don't even give a shit. Then you just … just turned your nose up at the patent profits from the Flyer, gave it all away to those colonists."

His voice took on a slightly accusatory tone. "Must be nice to come from a family where you don't have to think about what you can or can't afford. Where they serve you the opportunity to go to a place like the Kirk Centre up on a silver platter. Well, you know, Tom, some of us don't have that luxury."

Tervellyan stopped again, running a hand through his hair before looking straight at the camera.

"I guess I didn't really think what it all meant, just thought about the money. When I met Krall he told me they just wanted to crack the trade routes, throw a monkey wrench into Federation expansion plans - keep the Narov system nicely disorganized to allow their own line of business better access. That's just politics, right? No one gets hurt by politics. That's what I thought. No, I guess I _didn't _think. Didn't _want_ to think. Then we found those women… But even then, I kind of rationalized that those weren't the people I was working with. Until Lemarr. …"

Another deep breath, and a look at the ceiling.

"Hell, Tom - I know now just how badly I screwed up getting into bed with those guys. But you fucked up too, didn't you? _Didn't you_? More than once, even. And you came out of it, smelling like roses. And so I'm thinking, if I help Starfleet get those files, maybe I can fix something. Make it right, you know. Do _something_ right. But if you're hearing this, it probably didn't work. So anyway, I don't want you to think that I'm a complete fuck-up, like people used to think _you_ were. So there it is. Truth is, I tried to ride the tiger, Tom. And I fell off. And I may be about to get bitten. And that's okay. I guess."

Tervellyan's hand reached for the console, then stopped. He frowned briefly, as if he had remembered something, like an afterthought. "Oh, and please tell Nadine … oh, hell. Nevermind. She divorced me, almost right after I hooked up with the Syndicate. Women. It's like they have a sixth sense for … Well, whatever. I gotta go. Beam-out to Kalpak is in … fifteen minutes."

He reached forward again, and the transmission cut out abruptly. For a few minutes, Tom stared, unseeing, at the dark screen.

_I didn't warn them about the traceable antigen in time._

_Must be nice to come from a family where you don't have to think about what you can or can't afford. _

_You fucked up too, didn't you? _

"Stop it."

The voice startled him, and he turned around. He hadn't seen or heard her come in. Klingons were a thunderous people, by and large, but his half-human wife had always moved with the grace and silence of a cat.

"Stop what?"

"Finding a way of blaming yourself for what he did. Don't you see that's what _he's _doing? You had more money and more opportunities than he did, and that gives him an excuse to join the Syndicate? Typical criminal rationalization – offloading responsibility on the nearest handy target."

Tom was a little taken aback by the sharpness in B'Elanna's tone, even if he knew she was not generally the forgiving type. Why was she being so … aggressive? For some reason he could not fathom, he felt as if he needed to take Tervellyan's part.

"At least we know he had second thoughts, once he learned about the slave trade."

"Sure, yeah, _that_ was big. Woo-hoo. The whole idea of organized crime sucking the life out of people, or more immediately, the potential death of hundreds of thousands of Narovians who couldn't get our meds – all that was probably … too abstract for him to contemplate. I suppose to some people death and wrongdoing on a grand scale is just a statistic; they can feel sympathy only in small doses. So he had a sudden attack of conscience when he was forced to look Lemarr in the eye? Big deal. That doesn't give him a free pass in my book. And it shouldn't in yours, either, Tom."

Tom shook his head. "I don't know, B'Elanna. I honestly don't know what to think. It's all a bit too … raw right now. Can we deal with this later?"

B'Elanna took a deep breath and gave her husband a long look, took in the tired eyes – a clouded grey, rather than their usual sparkling blue - the tightness around his jaw. After nearly seven years of studying the enigmatic bundle of contradictions that was Tom Paris, she knew – however confident and gregarious a face he showed to the world - that if there was a way he could find evidence of personal failure in a sea of success, he would. He would, unfailingly, hone in on whatever he perceived as his own shortcomings; like seeking out a poisoned needle in a haystack, looking for the sting as a form of vindication.

And at no time was this trait more pronounced than when someone had been injured or killed on what he considered 'his watch'.

"I don't know, Tom. Can we?"

But she had also learned when to push, and when to leave things be for a while, and she sighed in resignation.

"Fine. But you won't escape me that easily. You know that, flyboy. Whatever Jarod Tervellyan was – do _not_ try and pretend you had anything to do with what he did or why he died, or by Kahless' bat'leth, I will kill you. Father of my child or not. Do you hear me?"

If he had learned anything from his long, painful discussions with Deanna Troi, it was that _not_ dealing with unpleasant things – eventually – was more problematic in the long run, but for now he didn't have any fight left in him.

"Fine, _Chief,_" he said, flashing a relieved and grateful grin at being temporarily let off the hook. "Just let me come to some conclusions first, okay?"

But there were some things he was perfectly happy to discuss, and if it allowed his wife the illusion of having gained something from this discussion, so much the better.

"Guess Starfleet will have to figure a number things out," he said. "Who knows what else he passed to the Syndicate while he was in Nacheyev's office. I actually feel sorry for her. She'll have some major cleaning up to do."

B'Elanna played along, if not happily. "I also wonder how he hooked up with Krall, if what he seemed to suggest is true. Picard may have to have a close look at who is sniffing around the Kirk Centre, to recruit high-value targets."

She grinned a little. "Wonder what it says about you, Tom Paris, that they didn't go after you, given your … record?"

Tom flashed a return smile to acknowledge her effort. "What record? I was pardoned, remember, Ms Almost-Terrorist?"

Neither of them bothered to hide their relief when the door chimed, and Asil strode into the ready room.

"I thought, Captain, that you would be interested to learn that we have successfully determined the nature of the unauthorized calls made from Crewman Cor Zelis' quarters."

Tom was, but only vaguely so; he hadn't really given the matter much thought after recent events. Asil did, however, provide a welcome distraction, and so he schooled his features into _concerned personnel management_ mode and invited the Vulcan to make her report.

"Yes?" he asked politely, noticing that B'Elanna was hanging around to hear. He knew he should probably ask her to leave, but since she'd wheedle the details out of him later anyway, he couldn't see a cogent reason why.

"Apparently Crewman Cor is in a dispute with her former husband over custody of their child, Algor. He does not believe that life on a starship provides a suitable upbringing for a young child, and wishes to raise the child on Bajor."

Tom put a restraining hand on B'Elanna's arm, before she could take issue with this patently unreasonable assumption, and nodded to Asil to continue.

"As a result of his application to a family mediator, she has been ordered to make daily reports to a Bajoran vedek about the child's progress and routine for a period of three months, after which the case will be assessed. Failure to make these reports could result in her losing the child to her husband."

Asil raised an eyebrow and permitted herself a rare editorial comment. "Clearly the authorities involved, in making this order, failed to take into consideration the operational constraints under which a Starfleet vessel must operate from time to time, and which may prevent such reporting."

Tom rolled his eyes, recalling the time when he had come close to being returned to Auckland, for failing to file the weekly reports that had been a condition of his temporary release. From the Delta Quadrant…

"Yeah, I've heard that before. And I assume she didn't want to bring this to our attention because she was afraid we might refuse to let her serve onboard, with her boy, under those conditions?"

"Precisely," Asil replied. "Shall I enter a reprimand into the Crewman's record, for violating the order on non-communication?"

Tom shook his head. There were infractions, and then there was … betrayal.

"I'm not a great believer in swatting flies with a photon cannon," he said. "She's new to Starfleet, and people's judgment tends to fly out the airlock when their kid is concerned. I'm not going to prove to this poor woman that her lack of confidence in us was justified. She's got enough to deal with, and she's a promising officer, willing to learn. Have a good chat with her about Starfleet regulations, and when exceptions to them can be asked for and will probably be granted."

After catching a slightly amused look from B'Elanna, he added judiciously, "Well, at least by _this _Captain."

Asil nodded, seemingly pleased in that inscrutable Vulcan way, and turned on her heel to leave. B'Elanna rose as well, but lingered for a moment.

"I'll leave you to your job now, _Captain._ But if I catch you flaying yourself over Tervellyan's betrayal, you have something coming."

Despite the fierceness of her words, the kiss she planted on his head as she left was tender, and the touch of her fingers lingered on his cheek long after the door had closed behind her.

Tom put his feet on his desk and stared at the ceiling - for what he later conceded to B'Elanna was an inordinately long time, for someone who had always claimed he didn't like deep thoughts. Swinging his feet down, he resorted to pacing. Finally, he came to a decision. He stopped abruptly, and his hand balled into a fist. Ignoring the pain inflicted on his palm by the nails digging into it, he looked at the ceiling and began to speak in an even, but firm tone.

"Computer, reopen personnel file Jarod Tervellyan, authorization Paris Epsilon-Lambda-Five. Amend recording, then reseal file." He took a long, slow breath, expelled the air again.

"Following the Stardate recorded for Commander Tervellyan's death, add these words: _In the line of duty_."

…..

_Two days later_

Tom stared at the screen before him, not sure what to make of the unexpected face, other than that perhaps it was not that unexpected after all.

"Captain … Admiral Janeway. What gives me the honour?"

Kathryn Janeway didn't bother to hide the gratified smile that flitted across her face at his little flub. She knew she would always be _the Captain_ to her old crew, and that was just fine with her – Starfleet Protocol be damned.

"First off, I have some good news for you, Tom. Headquarters has confirmed the field promotion you gave to Icheb. He's now officially an Ensign, and eligible for assignment to Voyager as science officer, as you requested. Please give him my personal congratulations."

Tom smiled a little to himself; recognizing Icheb's contribution to their mission had given him disproportionate pleasure. _My first official promotion. Won't Harry shit himself when he finds out._

But Janeway was not done yet.

"I also wanted to congratulate you on the completion of your first mission, Tom. That was … quite something. Even if it means I now have to go and do the diplomatic mopping up behind you. Again. It seems to be becoming a habit."

He chuckled ruefully. "Yeah, sorry about that. But personally, I can't think of anybody better suited than you for telling the Narovians that the Federation is a better bet than organized crime, when it comes to long-term peace and prosperity."

"Well, truth be told, I always wanted to see the Snowflakes. Now I'll get the chance, and in the middle of the dance, too, when Starfleet won't normally let non-essential missions go there." She smiled a little ruefully. "But I suppose they won't let me make a detour to explore. I'm headed straight for the Union capital on Arren; the Narovians want to deal with the Orion problem centrally, rather than on a member planet basis."

"That's probably wise," Tom said cautiously, beginning to wonder now what she was really after. For reasons he could not fathom, he had been included in all the follow-on reporting on the infiltration; she must have seen his name on the distribution list, and would know that he was familiar with the approach Starfleet and the Federation were taking. He had even injected the occasional unsolicited comment. So why comm to tell him about it?

He took in her clear, grey-blue gaze, those eyes that had followed his every step, his every misstep, for seven years. And he knew. This was not Admiral Janeway, contacting Captain Paris.

This was Kathryn, calling Tom.

Tom had always found that with Janeway, getting to the point was far more rewarding than any attempt at prevarication or humorous deflection. The trick was finding out what she was after.

"But I don't suppose you commed me to discuss the political parameters of your next mission. You have what views I have on the matter – for what they're worth. You want to know just how much I'm beating myself up over losing my First Officer, right?"

He was surprised by the vehemence of her response, and the absence of even _pro forma_ denial.

"The First Officer who was an agent for the Orion Crime Syndicate, and who willingly betrayed everything you and I stand for, until his belated change of heart. Yes, I admit, I was concerned that you might flatter yourself into thinking you could have found him out sooner and prevented his death, if you'd only been clairvoyant, or had tried harder."

_Well, that didn't take long. _Tom shook his head, giving her his most reassuring smile.

"No reason to worry on that score, Captain. I mean, Chakotay _slept _with a Cardassian spy for the better part of a year, without having the slightest idea. As far as personal betrayals to beat yourself over the head with are concerned, Jarod Tervellyan registers at best a three on the Seska scale. And besides, B'Elanna has already talked me out of feeling responsible for his joining the Syndicate. So I'm okay."

She raised an eyebrow, not even bothering to hide her skepticism. "Really. I think we've all heard _that_ from you before, Thomas Eugene Paris. The thing is, I know a bit about what it's like to be on your first mission as Captain, and have one of your officers or crewmembers die. It's _not _okay. It's _never_ okay."

Of course she knew. _Thirty-two, the day the Caretaker had flung Voyager into the Delta Quadrant. Everyone who had perished on the long journey home. _

"I'm scheduled for psych detox as soon as we drop off the last of our meds on Pekal III and get back to Earth. Our schedule coincides with the Enterprise's return, so Deanna will be doing it herself. And yeah, there's some crap there I wouldn't mind discussing. With _her_."

The implicit dismissal in his tone was unmistakable, but Kathryn was nothing if not persistent – whether it came to dealing with the Borg Queen, or with a recalcitrant former helmsman.

"I'm not a counselor, Tom. I have no intention of trying to do what Deanna Troi can. And I'm sure as hell not going to push you. But I feel partly responsible for those pips being on your collar, and I want to ensure that they stay there."

"Ah. The mentor thing, is it. From Paris to Janeway, and now Janeway back to Paris. Paying advice forward, the Starfleet way. Tell me, did my father put you up to this?"

Janeway refused to be goaded by his provocatively sarcastic tone. She smiled, a little ruefully. "Your wife actually, if you must know. She thought I might be able to get through the proverbial Paris brick wall, before you rip those pips off and throw them out the nearest airlock. But don't hold it against her - I would have commed anyway, just to see how you were coping."

_Shit. _What was it with the women in his life that they insisted on trying to get him to shine a searchlight on his insides every chance they got? Tom sighed. And made a sudden decision. _You want me to spill my guts? Fine. See what it gets you, Admiral. See if you still think I'm a worthy replacement for you on this ship, when I'm done._

"_Fine_. You want to know _how I'm coping_? Okay, here it is. What really bothers me, _Kathryn_, is not that I failed to twig to the fact that Jarod Tervellyan was playing for the other team, or that he died trying to rejoin ours. Or even that I ordered him to go on that mission on Kalpak, where he was captured. I suppose that sort of thing is what I'll have to get used to, if I want to play at being a Captain."

She breathed deeply. There it was – much faster than she had expected, the use of her first name signaling that he would be speaking the truth, at least the truth as he saw it.

"What bothers me, is that _I set him up to die_. By not telling Jarod that I asked the Doc to mark the antigen, I basically turned him into a sitting duck for the Syndicate's punishment. They don't take kindly to failure of any kind. I believe the line they use is, _Failure has its price. _They kill their members over it. Some of them kill themselves, rather than be … dealt with in the way the Syndicate usually does. Like that woman."

He paused for a moment, taking a deep breath. "And the reason I didn't want to say anything to my First Officer about that rather ingenious Paris ploy? It was because I wasn't sure it would work. I didn't … I didn't want to look like an idiot_._"

With the words finally out, the admission that had withstood repeated attempts by B'Elanna and two comm conversations with Deanna Troi, was now clearly written across Tom's face. Kathryn wished, more than anything, that she could reach out to him and grab him by the shoulder, to provide the good shaking and the comforting touch that he clearly needed in equal measure.

"Tom, Jarod Tervellyan chose the path he embarked on in the full knowledge that the Syndicate is unforgiving. And your not telling anyone about the nanoprobes, even if you couldn't have known it at the time, probably ended up saving hundreds of thousands of lives. Your plan, and more particularly the fact that the Syndicate's anointed spy didn't know about it, made possible the eventual proper distribution of the antigen, and enabled Starfleet to break the Orion's hold over the Narov system."

She paused briefly, to fire up the right kind of glare to underscore her point. "I don't need to remind you that Tervellyan had acquiesced to the Syndicate's plans, which included the death of civilians for lack of medical assistance. What youmay not know is that investigators have also been able to trace transmissions to him that led to a number of Starfleet contacts in the Snowflakes being burnt. Eight of them died, six are still missing."

Tom shook his head in vigorous denial. "No, Captain, you don't understand. So, yeah, the guy did some despicable things, and I got lucky - keeping my mouth shut was the right thing in hindsight. But what I can't escape is the fact that _I caused his death_, Kathryn. I painted that target on his forehead."

His voice shook. "Because of my goddamn ego. _Again._"

She saw them then, clearly reflected in his eyes – felt their presence as a chill blast across the years, across the vastness of space. They had followed him to the Delta Quadrant and back, quieted at times, but never dispelled: The ghosts of Caldik Prime.

Kathryn swallowed, found herself searching for the right words. Words that would not reopen – or, worse, pretend to try and close - the wound in Tom Paris that would never heal. What she could offer, though, were words that might just allow him to move on.

"Tom, every human being, every Starfleet Captain has a weak spot. Mine has always been, and always will be, thinking that I _couldn't possibly_ _fail_ at anything I set my mind to. Yours is, and probably always will be, the fear that you _might_, or the belief that you _did. _Ego issues, yes, we both have them. And they're not that different, really – we both assume that we should be better than we actually are. Two sides of the same coin. We both got fed Starfleet lessons with our mother's milk, we just drew different conclusions from the same raw material."

She watched his face intently. His jaw seemed set in defiance – he had made his determination, pronounced himself guilty, but his eyes, fixed on hers with a burning stare, seemed open to her appeal.

"But you know what, Tom? Despite our various shortcomings, we both seem to be getting things done. Useful things. Important things. Things that matter, and that make a difference. Not many people can say that they helped save a whole star system from infiltration and corruption, _Captain_ Paris."

She chuckled a little in self-deprecation. "Sometimes I think, you and I, we succeed more by good luck than good management. But succeed we do. And as long as we take each experience as an opportunity to learn something, and surround ourselves with good friends and people who have our back and prop us up when we stumble, we'll be okay, and our respective egos will get in the way only when we let them."

Tom knew she had delivered the message she had wanted him to hear, and he knew that what she had told him would be useful, eventually - even if it did not make him feel a whole lot better about himself this very instant. He would have to replay what she had told him in his mind a few times, and probably to B'Elanna, who would no doubt be grilling him about this discussion with Klingon subtlety as soon as Miral was asleep.

Maybe, eventually, some of what Janeway had just told him might even sink in.

Knowing also that the conversation would now best be returned to the light-hearted banter that had always made their heart-to-hearts go down so much easier, he flashed a grin, however tentative and short-lived.

"So what I take away from all that is that you want me to keep those pips. And that somewhere between you and me, between the most … _secure _and the most fragile ego in Starfleet, there's a perfect Captain." He paused for effect. "I hope I never meet him. Or her."

Her eyes warmed in a smile, knowing exactly what he was doing, and loving him for it, just a little.

"Picard?"

Tom picked up the ball easily, the grin staying on his face long enough this time to bring out the deepening creases around his eyes.

"Not on your life. He still thinks of his stint as Locutus of Borg as an instance of personal failure, and has vowed to spend the rest of his life making up for it, by drilling people in various forms of creative warfare. Will Riker and I _both_ bear the scars of this particular devotion."

The mention of Riker easily deflected the discussion into a recounting of the Enterprise's role in Voyager's adventure, and about Harry Kim's impending reassignment. Nacheyev had rolled over almost instantly, Kathryn gleefully reported; whether it was because she felt she owed Tom a first officer of his choice or because she was too busy cleaning up her office to think about the matter, no one knew.

And all talk of beneficial mutual emancipation from one another had evaporated when Tom had popped the question to his best friend. "He didn't even have to ask Libby, he said. And Miral is ecstatic to have Baby Tommy back to carry around again and show stuff to."

Inquiries about her goddaughter, the Doc and other former crewmembers filled the remainder of the call. And when Kathryn Janeway signed off, she did so content in the knowledge that while Tom Paris would doubtlessly yet be facing a number of sleepless nights, the new Captain of Voyager was exactly where he needed to be, even if he did not, at times, realize it - in control of the ship that would forever bind them together.

…..

_Earth: Three weeks later_

In the cool and damp of a San Francisco winter afternoon, Voyager's surviving senior officers stood in silence for the second funeral of the day. While the first had been private at the request of the dead officer's family, holocameras whirred as eighteen identical urns were lowered, one by one, into a single grave, the headstone already in place. The authorities of their home planet had expressed no interest in the bodies' repatriation.

Tom and B'Elanna stood side by side, their arms touching, drawing strength from each other's presence as they were exchanging the occasional glance and whispered word. The EMH looked more grim-faced than ever; the lone Vulcan in the group betrayed no emotion, although to a discerning friend her absolute stillness might have suggested that she was exercising a deeper control than was usual.

Lieutenant Mike Ayala's left arm, for so long far more used to the smooth touch of a phaser than to the warmth of another body, was wrapped protectively around the shoulders of a young woman in the light-grey of non-Federation candidates for the Academy. Her skin glowed green in the pale light, and the fingers of her right hand curled lightly around Ayala's. She tentatively rested her head back against his shoulder, as if trying to listen and to determine whether, at some point in the future, her world might yet contain a heartbeat other than her own. The young Captain's eyes warmed briefly at the sight.

A lone piper stood off to the side. Orion III had no known musical tradition, and so the untamed, elemental music of the Scottish highlands floated over the small crowd, the elegiac strands of "Wild Mountain Thyme" melting into the wind like tears in the rain.

The voices of reporters could be heard, commenting on the stirring beauty of the simple service, as well as the unobtrusive but noticeable security presence. In hushed tones, they relayed to their audience such indignation and concern as their editors had deemed appropriate in response to what those coffins represented.

Starfleet's chief of communications, Eric Henderson, had pulled out all the stops to ensure that the occasion would be a memorable one - somberly choreographed, deeply affecting. "Awareness raising," he had called it, when a skeptical Tom Paris questioned the propriety of turning the burial of the women, now known as the Orion Eighteen, into a media event.

"Starfleet wants to make sure that their story is known. You said yourself that what's required is a change in attitudes to what these 'slave girls' really are, and we have to begin somewhere, Captain. Your name has resonance in the Quadrant. A public burial, with your picture attached, will draw attention, make people aware of the issues and – hopefully – serve to reduce … demand for their services."

Tom nodded briefly at Eric across the burial site. They had met a few times before - never in circumstances Tom cherished in memory – nor was this the first, or even the second, time his name had been used by Starfleet to make a public point. At least this time there were no judges involved, and his consent had been sought and given.

As they stood in the chill of that San Francisco afternoon, Tom knew as surely as he knew anything that a new front had just been opened; the first known victims of this war, a war that few yet knew was being fought, were being lowered into the ground this day. And so Tom straightened his shoulders as the holocams whirred, and stared his challenge into their lenses.

Voyager and her crew would be ready.

_….._

_**Epilogue**_

_In a mansion in the lush, bird-loud Kalaor hills of Orion III, under the fading but still warm light of the blue-white sun - known also as Bellatrix, or the Amazon star - a jeweled hand reaches for a holovid, transmitted across the light years from the heart of the Federation. Gently, almost with a caress, The Lady traces the face of the tall, sandy-haired man who stands ramrod straight by an open grave, seemingly looking directly at her through the lens of the vidcam._

"_Is that him?" her sibilant voice asks softly as she taps the image lightly with a golden nail, before setting it down on the glass table beside her and reaching for her glass. _

"_Yes, my Lady. That is Captain Thomas Paris, of the Starship Voyager. Do you have Orders pertaining to him, my Lady?"_

_The silence stretches for minutes, the only sound now the silvery hum of a finger circling the rim of the fine Antarean crystal. There will be no interruption of the Lady's reflections, as she ponders the man who disrupted a promising operation in that very precious space close to - but not of - the Federation and its riches. _

_Who cost her the services of one of her most trusted lieutenants, even if she would have had to mete out punishment to that one herself in due course. That ship and its cargo should have been destroyed, not simply abandoned; a cascading error the woman had acknowledged, if not in sufficient time, in the proper manner. _

_Failure has its price. _

_Finally, a breath, and a verdict. "Not at this time. Seeking him out would be more costly to us than useful." She sets down her glass again, delicately, so it would not jar her thoughts with the dissonant sound of glass on glass. _

"_His actions have proven, though, that the time was not yet right for … the kind of expansion of Our operations that our advisors promised Us. One day We will rule whole star systems, but that day is not yet. Not yet."_

_Another delicate sip; a dark tongue slowly traces a drop of crystalline liquid that threatens to run down the side of the crystal chalice. The High Servant shivers a little at the sight, his mouth opening as he shudders his next breath._

"_I do have Orders for you in respect of those whose planning and execution of Our hoped-for growth has failed us. Their excessive ambition has cost Us dearly, and they must be punished. First Orders in this respect are for … Darmoth Krall."_

_The name cracks from her tongue like the lash of a whip. Choosing to entrust the Syndicate's secrets and ambitions to one who would betray Her, then bringing diverted goods undisguised to a place frequented by Starfleet, had been … inexcusable errors in judgment. Krall's arrogance had cost the Syndicate dearly: Starfleet's raids on its cells and their holdings in the Narov system had been most effective. _

_She corrals her momentary fury, regains control. Showing anger before a Servant is weakness, unless that Servant is its object. Serenity settles over her once more, like the gossamer fabric that barely covers her body and is lifted and stirred by the breeze coming off the Kalaor hills. _

"_I trust Our reach into the Federation's prison system remains in place?"_

_The Lady takes a breath; her eyes acquire a glint of cold duranium as she takes the measure of the High Servant before her, appreciating the silent yet confident nod he gives in affirmation of her query. He inclines his head a little longer than necessary, an almost-bow, to show his supplication. It is nicely done, two gestures in one, but she does not acknowledge his response; it is, after all, given as her due. _

_She does, however, run her eyes over his lean body; naked to the waist and lightly oiled, he stands straight and with his legs a little apart, as she prefers. She moistens her lips a little in anticipation of the pleasures his readiness to serve may yet provide her that night. His nostrils flare as he catches her scent, and his eyes widen imperceptibly as he understands once again his place._

_Ownership has its privileges._

"_That said, this Captain Paris and his crew have been … inconvenient. He must not be given the opportunity to interfere with Our plans again."_

"_Understood, my lady. He will be dealt with swiftly and effectively the next time his path should cross that of your … desires." _

_The last word is drawn out, just a little. He is cheeky, this one, and her interest in teaching him her ways - and the errors of presumption - grows._

"_It is well." _

_She nods her approval, just once, and the High Servant suppresses a shudder of relief and awe. It has been a difficult few days for all in the House, dancing on the knife's edge of The Lady's displeasure, waiting for the cut. Some bled. But he has been asked to pass on the Orders; this means they are not for him. That She has expressed Her pleasure in his presence, even dipped Her head to him ever so lightly, means that he will be permitted to continue to serve Her. _

_He will be ready for Her when She calls for him, later, as he now knows she will. Body and soul, he belongs to Her. Already, he quivers in anticipation; his senses are deliciously heightened by his ever-present fear, which he feels like the touch of her golden nails on his heated skin._

_She knows, she sees, and her lips curl lightly. She waves her dismissal with four fingers that barely lift off her still-shapely thigh._

"_There are other matters of business requiring Our attention, for now. Leave Us."_

_The many bracelets on the green hand tinkle lightly as The Lady reaches for another PADD, already turning her mind to the next shipment, and newer, more profitable destinations for her wares._

* * *

><p>AUTHOR'S END NOTE:<p>

As some of you have noted, I occasionally infuse my geeky fan fiction with a hint of realism. My abiding love of the Star Trek universe is, in fact, based to a large part on the shows' readiness to make us look at our own reality through the tempered, but nonetheless crystal clear, lens of speculative fiction. (Here's looking at you, Gene Roddenberry - _thank you_.)

The reality behind this story is that the trafficking of human beings, particularly of women and children, for the purposes of sexual or commercial exploitation remains one of the most lucrative endeavours for organized crime. According to the UN's Global Initiative to Fight Trafficking, an estimated 2.5 million people are held in forced labour, including in the sex trade, at any given time. Over forty percent of recruiters and traffickers are female.

This industry of human misery is made possible, in part, by the fact that very few jurisdictions on Earth expressly address, and even fewer prosecute, the fact that the victims' customers use their 'services' essentially without their consent – something that constitutes rape by any definition I know. As the US State Department's latest _Report on Trafficking in Persons_ states, "A sophisticated understanding of the realities on the ground is necessary to ensure that sex trafficking victims are not wrongly discounted as consenting adults. Too often, police, prosecutors, judges, and policymakers assume a victim has free will if she has the physical ability to walk away. This assumption is wholly inconsistent with what is known about the nature of pimping and sex trafficking."

There are many aspects to the phenomenon of human trafficking, and I do not claim to have the answers. But it is clear that until demand is stemmed, the criminal organizations that supply and profit from the services trafficking victims provide will continue to do so.

And slavery will continue to thrive.


End file.
